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In the days before her husband, Gaylen Vance, died of a brain tumor, Shirley Ewing was asked over and over if she was sure she still wanted him to be an organ donor.
To her, the answer was simple. She pulled aside her sons and asked their opinion.
"They said, 'Dad's a giving guy. Let's keep giving, Mom,'" Ewing said.
That gift kept on giving, potentially saving the lives of four recipients and, in Ewing's case, leading to a friendship with one recipient and a passion for organ donation.
Ewing, a teacher at Silver Lake public schools, spoke to the Grand Island Rotary Club on Tuesday about her story on behalf of the Nebraska Organ Retrieval System.
Vance, who farmed near Bladen, south of Hastings, and Ewing had not thought much about organ donation before 1994, when he started feeling harsh headaches.
They had made the commitment the year before to be organ donors, but being in their early 40s, never thought the opportunity to do so would come so soon.
Within a few days, Vance's headaches were diagnosed as a brain tumor, and soon, he was declared brain dead.
Virtually every usable part of Vance's body went somewhere. His heart provided a transplant for a 55-year-old man. One kidney went to a 63-year-old man, the other, plus his pancreas, to a 54-year-old woman.
His liver, a vein, a nerve, his corneas all of them went toward transplants or research.
That's all Ewing heard about his contributions she sent letters through the Nebraska Organ Retrieval System to the recipients, though because the program is anonymous, she couldn't include details about her husband's name or residence.
Still, one man, the recipient of Vance's heart, found Ewing. He had put together clues from her letter with obituaries from around the time he received his heart.
In 1999, he called her up, and the next year, they met for the first time, at a restaurant in Omaha.
Ewing formed a good friendship with the man, and they now speak several times a year. He celebrates two birthdays: The day he was born and the day he received his new heart.
Now, Ewing travels throughout the state, telling her story and encouraging others to become organ donors, too.
Few get to see their impact as clearly as Ewing did, but she said the impact from organ donation is still there. One organ donor can save up to seven lives, she said, and one tissue donor can improve the lives of as many as 60 people.
Ewing spoke of organ donation in relation to the birth and death dates on gravestones, and the dash between them that represents our lives.
"Is it a final date of your life?" Ewing said of the death date. "Or is it just a continuation of your life helping someone else?"
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