They’ve donated blood 475 times

The monthly blood donation at the Red Cross in the Marxstraße on Saturday, 13th December, 2014 saw a group of donors thanked for their long-term commitment.

Manfred Schneider, 66 years old and himself from Oberursel, donated blood for the 75th time.  He started donating 20 years ago when he moved to the town and was himself a trainer at the Red Cross.

Wolfgang Agel, 59 years old and from Bad Homburg had followed the call to come to the neighbouring town for the 125th time, citing the fact that the dates suited him better here.  He started donating blood in 1974, which was an important year for him.  Not only did he start his national service, but he also got married.  He was given special leave to attend the blood donation and used the opportunity to visit his wife.

Kosmas Rehberg, Ulrich Heitbrink, Wolfgang Agel and Manfred Schneider

Kosmas Rehberg, Ulrich Heitbrink, Wolfgang Agel and Manfred Schneider (back row) with Christine Schöck (left) and Michaela Tappenden from the Oberursel Red Cross and Jürgen Swobodo (right) from the Blood Donor Service

Kosmas Rehberg, 56 years old and from Bommersheim also donated for the 125th time.  He started donating when he was 18 years old and a neighbour took him along to the then central school in Oberursel.  He remembers that back then it was only once each year.

But it was Ulrich Heitbrink, 64 years old, who was the clear leader making his 150th donation.  When he started donating at the age of 18 in the North Rhine Palatinate state he was still considered a minor and needed his parents’ permission each time.  In 1974 he moved to Stierstadt and finally in 1979 to Weißkirchen, at which point he started donating in Oberursel.  “I just wanted to do something good that was easy to do”, he explained.

All four donors received a certificate and pin showing the number of donations that they have made from the Blood Donor Service, along with a hamper for the 125th and 150th donations or a bottle of wine for the 75th from the local Red Cross group.

This article appeared in German in the Oberurseler Woche on Thursday, 8th January, 2015.

 

About Graham Tappenden

Graham Tappenden is a British ex-pat who first came to Oberursel in 1993 and returned with his family to live there in 2003. He has been writing for AllThingsGerman.net since 2006. When not writing blog posts or freelancing for the Oberurseler Woche he works as a self-employed IT consultant solving computer problems and designing websites. In 2016 he gained German citizenship.

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