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The Denver Postdenverpost.comPosted: 12/17/2012 06:49:30 PM MSTDecember 18, 2012 1:58 AM GMTUpdated: 12/17/2012 06:58:13 PM MST
When Andrea Jaeger turned up in Newtown, Conn., last Friday following the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary, the former tennis star found "a war zone."
"There was grief beyond words," said Jaeger after she returned to her home near Hesperus in southwest Colorado.
Jaeger, 47, who has devoted a lifetime outside of professional tennis to helping children in need, said she drove to Newtown Friday when she heard about the shooting while she was in Staten Island, N.Y. helping families displaced by Hurricane Sandy.
She said she drove into a traumatized town where a temporary morgue had been set up in a freezer truck and where the bodies of the slain children and adults still lay in the crime scene of Sandy Hook Elementary School.
She made her way to churches to offer a shoulder and an ear to traumatized residents. She told some children that she talked to that it was OK to smile again. She bought toys for the schools at a local toy store and she left 27 white roses outside the school for each of the slain.
"Acts of kindness can be far-reaching," said Jaeger of her efforts.
Jaeger is no novice at offering kindness in tragedies involving children.
Her philanthropy began when she was still a young tennis prodigy — the youngest seeded player in Wimbledon history. She played her way to second in the world before retiring from competitive tennis in 1987.
When she was still at the top of her game and traveling the world, she would often deliver toys to children in hospitals. She and a friend started a foundation to help children with cancer when she was barely 15. She was still a teenager when she was playing tennis at Madison Square Garden and took time to travel to White Plains, N.Y., to offer solace to kids and family members affected by a rash of suicides.
In 1996, she hopped a plane to Dublane, Scotland when a former scout leader massacred 16 school children and a teacher. She took the kids gifts and she gave them tennis lessons. One of them was Andy Murray, who survived the shooting, and who is now the top ranked tennis player in England.
More than two decades ago, Jaeger started the Little Star Foundation, which helps children with cancer.
During that time, she nearly took final vows as a Catholic nun, but abandoned that, she said, because she couldn't spend enough time on worldly matters and still be able to fulfill the commitments required of her as a nun. Jaeger said she still carries on the same mission she had as an aspiring nun.
"Each action we do with pure and kind intention has the potential to turn into great things," Jaeger said.
Nancy Lofholm: 970-256-1957, nlofholm
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