"Dedicated to Rebuilding Lives Torn Apart By War, Poverty, and Disaster"

Letter from OAE
(Spanish)/(English)

Congressional
Record

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EL NUEVO HERALD

Miami, Florida
 

By Maria Travierso

WINGS OF VALOR, a humanitarian organization located in Miami recently delivered over 2,000 pounds of medicines in Nicaragua as part of its program dedicated to rebuilding lives of people affected by war, and in this case, of many who fought in the Nicaraguan Resistance. The Organization of American States cooperated with this mission. "It was wonderful to have been able to personally take this assistance and to have been able to deliver it to the places where it was most needed, ", stated Janet Ray Weininger, President of Wings of Valor. The purchase of the medicines was made possible due to the generosity of the people of Louisville, Kentucky, who donated $25,000 raised through a grass-roots effort of churches and other community organizations. This was Ray Weininger’s 16^th mission to Nicaragua, which took place at the beginning of November. Traveling with her was Rosario Roman, a Nicaraguan exiled in Miami since 1979, and currently an educational administrator at Miami-Dade Community College.

"We traveled to San Jose de Bocay, 180 kilometers northeast of Managua, and visited the villages of Ayapal, San Juan de Awaswas, Plan de Grama, San Jose de Bocay, and Wiwili. It was a two-day trip, on dirt roads and having to cross over several rivers, but at the end, the smiles and appreciation from the people who received the medicines was the best reward," stated Roman.

Ray Weininger explained "that the medicines were purchased directly from the manufacturer making it possible to acquire $26-worth of medicines for every dollar that was donated." "In reality, we took almost $650,000 worth of medicines," she added. The medicines were transported directly to Managua by the manufacturer. In a joint effort with Wings of Valor, the Organization of American States office provided the trucks and the drivers for the distribution to the remote villages in the northern mountainous area. In addition to the medicine, Ray Weininger and Roman took over 1400 pounds of toys and clothes.

Wings of Valor was founded over a year ago by Ray Weininger, who after several years of a dedicated search was able to recover the remains of her father, Thomas "Pete" Ray. His remains had been kept in a Havana (Cuba) morgue after he was shot down and killed while flying a mission during the Bay of Pigs Invasion. Her anguish of many years motivated her to help family members of other pilots who had perished in Nicaragua. She traveled to Nicaragua with members of the US government to look for the remains of these two pilots whose plane had crashed in the northern mountains of Nicaragua.

(305) 255-0606. You can also contact them at wingsvalor@aol.com or visit their web site: http://www.wingsofvalor.org

Wings of Valor, Inc.
P.O. Box 56-2801
Miami, Florida 33256-2801
Phone: (305) 255-8892 Fax: (305) 232-9933

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