AFW Board Member Paula Inhelder had been interested in the Native American culture since going on field trips in high school. Paula met and married her husband in 1988 who was working as a park ranger in Limon State Park. Both she and her husband loved engaging with the surrounding Native American culture.
AFW volunteers Paula Inhelder and her husband at an AFW booth promoting the organization for our outreach.
In 2002, her husband was diagnosed with prostate cancer and his doctor was a 13-hour drive away in Los Angeles. That is when they found AFW and Paula then became more involved with AFW “wanting to give back to AFW. We were used to giving and not getting, but it was getting harder and harder.” After her husband lost his fight with cancer, Paula continued to volunteer and joined the board of directors in 2016.
At the peak of the COVID crisis, Paula connected AFW with Brian Snyder of Lifeline Christian Mission who provided donated fresh produce, rice and bean packages, and dairy products to Native American communities in the Four Corners region. These reservations have been hit especially hard, and lock downs and curfews have limited access to food and supplies.
Unloading Stephen’s plane in Kingman, Arizona are Candida Hunter and Lawrence Koyayseva of the Hualapai tribe.
Angel Flight West pilots transported the donations from Winslow, AZ to Chinle, AZ; Shiprock, NM; and Kingman, AZ, for the people of the Hualapai and Havasupai tribes. Twenty-six Command Pilots flew over 40 missions supplying over 11,000 pounds of much needed food to these reservations. Candida Hunter, a leader in the Hualapai community, was the contact for receiving the donations. Candida and her team were on hand to meet all of the flights that came into the Kingman Airport.
Paula says of her Native American community and AFW: “Our community is collaborative in nature. With all the bad things you hear on the news, it’s heartwarming to see people rolling up their sleeves and make good things happen.”
