AARP Wyoming Honors Cheyenne Volunteer, Judy Weickum

Cheyenne’s Judy Weickum was honored by AARP Wyoming with the organization’s Eddie Wadda Community Service Award Thursday.

In true volunteer fashion, Weickum was not able to receive her award, as he was putting the final touches for its first fundraising event for the Friday Food Bag Foundation in Cheyenne. The Kickoff for Kids event will feature, dinner, dancing, and a keynote address by former Denver Bronco Coach Mike Shanahan tomorrow night at Little America.

Weickum is one of the driving forces behind the Friday Foodbag Foundation, which provides approximately 900 food bags weekly to kids who get free or reduced breakfast and lunch at school in Laramie County School District 1 and 2. The work is done entirely through volunteer efforts and donations. Last year the Friday Food Bag took in over $150,000 in donations.

The Friday Foodbag Foundation shares Judy with several other volunteer groups in Cheyenne. The Greeley, Colo. native is perhaps best-known for her ladies ready-to-wear store, The Statement,” located in the Hitching Post. Her benefit fashion shows were well known in Cheyenne with live circus animals sharing the runway with the models.

While she worked at The Statement, Weickum began a life of volunteer and service to her community. She and Ronn Jeffries started Special Friends, which continues as a part of Youth Alternatives in Cheyenne. She was instrumental towards starting the Culinary Cook-off, which is the major annual fundraiser for the developmental pre-school STRIDE, in Cheyenne. Along with legendary hotelier, the late Paul Smith, Weickum spearheaded a series of dinners hosted by patrons in their homes to benefit STRIDE.

Weickum is also a member of the Cheyenne Rotary Club and St.Mark's Episcopal church. Weickum lies in Cheyenne with her husband, Ron. She has two grown children, Jeff Hanson and Rock Hanson.

The AARP Community Contact Award was renamed the Eddie Wadda Community Service Award in 2012 in honor of former AARP Wyoming volunteer Eddie Wadda, a member of the Eastern Shoshone Tribe and an outstanding AARP Community Volunteer. Wadda was a great example of the power of volunteers who are willing to work for those in their community. In 2018, AARP Wyoming honors two women whose community is better for the work they are doing, Laramie’s Jody Lowe and Weickum.