96-Year-Old Seamstress Makes Masks for Healthcare Workers: ‘It’s like a War Effort’

An elderly woman in Loganville, Georgia, is using her sewing skills to make sure people have what they need to protect themselves from the coronavirus.

Ninety-six-year-old Nancy Williams became a seamstress when she was a little girl, according to WSB-TV.

Recently, the senior began using her sewing machine and a spool of thread to help protect her community from the virus.

“Her mother was a seamstress in Vienna, Georgia, where mother grew up,” said Williams’ daughter, Joan Ottinger.

“Mother picked it up back then, because they made everything they wore,” she explained.

Years ago, Williams sewed beautiful clothes for Miss Georgia winners who went on to compete in the Miss America pageant.

Now, she makes cloth masks for the healthcare professionals at her senior living facility and for her grandchildren and great-grandchildren who work in the medical field.

“My daughter says it’s like a ‘war effort.’ It’s for the virus. And I hand them to anyone who wants one,” Williams said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) website recommended that people wear cloth masks in situations in which social distancing guidelines might be difficult to follow, such as grocery stores, pharmacies, and in “areas of significant community-based transmission.”

“Cloth face coverings fashioned from household items or made at home from common materials at low cost can be used as an additional, voluntary public health measure,” the site read.

So far, Williams has sewn 150 masks but said she is just getting started.

“I hope I can make enough. I can’t make enough for the whole world, but maybe I can make enough for the people around us here,” she commented.

Ottinger said the sewing machine has always been her mother’s sidekick and added that her efforts to help the community get through the health crisis mean so much to their family.

“We’re very proud of her,” she concluded.