Every time Sheri Wolf enters her home, she passes a singular slab of stone on her porch. It’s more than a memory of the place her family called home. It’s a symbol of survival.
“It's kind of surreal. But, we shouldn't have lived, but we did,” Wolf said.
Wolf, her son and her mother were among the many residents transported out of Greenfield due to injuries after an EF4 tornado tore through the town in southwest Iowa on the afternoon of May 21, 2024.
The twister in Greenfield left 35 injured and 5 dead, including a woman in nearby Adams county. It also demolished more than 150 homes, leaving millions of dollars worth of damage in its wake.
Wolf’s brother salvaged the foundation stone after the disaster while she and her family members were all hospitalized for injuries.
One year later, she said it feels like it happened yesterday.
“We survived. We were taken from the house, we were picked up and thrown out, and we're just lucky to be alive.”
During the tornado, Wolf was sucked out of her home. She landed two houses away before regaining consciousness. Her mother and son were also lifted out of the house by strong winds.
When she awoke, Wolf had suffered head, sternum and leg injuries and sustained deep cuts. Her mother, DyAnne, sustained broken ribs, a broken jaw, back injuries and deep tissue damage. Her son, Sawyer, also had back and collarbone injuries.
Wolf said she and her family are still healing, and the past year has been an emotional road.
“People have asked me, ‘Well, how are you doing?’" Wolf said. “‘Fine’ – I don’t know. How do you explain to somebody that you’re scared to be out of your house sometimes or you have to find a little comfy hole and you don’t want to come out of that, because it’s just trauma you face every day.”
Her family moved to Greenfield from Afton only three weeks before the storm to stay in a one-level house with no steps — a requirement she had for their new home. Wolf said her family lost everything when the tornado hit, including birth certificates, social security cards, driver’s licenses, phones and financial documents.
Now, all three family members live in Creston in a home community members rented for her when she initially was released from the hospital last summer. Over the past year, they’ve been able to furnish their house in Creston through donations from family and friends.
She and her family, like many residents in Greenfield that day, still experience anxiety when storm clouds loom on the horizon or from the sound of a loud truck driving by.
Recently, Wolf went to a disaster training as part of her work at the community services agency, MATURA. She said she got a lot out of it.
“One thing that hit me hard was taking care of yourself after that kind of a trauma, and you know you have to talk it out,” she said. “And if you're not doing something that you love to do, or a hobby or whatever, then you're not taking care of yourself. It can be as simple as painting your nails or buying a new shampoo, whatever — it's just the little things that mean 100% more than they ever did.”
The Community Reflects
The National Weather Service recorded 11 tornadoes across the state on the afternoon of May 21, including nine within the area monitored by the NWS Des Moines office.
On the anniversary of the tornado, residents packed into pews in the sanctuary of the former First Presbyterian Church of Greenfield for a memorial service to reflect on all that was lost and rebuilt in the past year.
Four roses were placed in the front of the sanctuary to honor the lives of the four Greenfield residents who died due to the tornado — Michael Jensen, Dean Wiggins, Pam Wiggins and Lee Williamson.
Andrea McNeese called the four, “true Greenfield locals.”
“They enjoyed the town that they lived in along with this community, more than we can probably even remember — whether it was helping on committees, serving in ways of being a friendship on the golf course or by striking up a conversation at a local gun show or flea market,” she said. “They all were a presence to this town.”
Bells tolled 60 times. That was followed by a moment of silence in homage to the time it took the tornado to sweep through the town.
Speakers also recognized the individuals, first responders and organizations that helped the community recover by helping pull people from the debris, offering meals, making donations or providing emotional support.
“In the face of such tragedy, we also witnessed the best of humanity,” McNeese said. “The compassion and courage offered by each of us to each other helped us through that dark time as we stand together in unity and healing.”
Fifty-year Greenfield resident, Kathy Smuck, attended the service. Afterward, she said she felt “uplifted.” She said the anniversary brings it all back.
“We were very fortunate, we did not lose our house,” she said. “I lost our best friends, and all my friends lost their houses. So you go through it with them.”
Community Recovery & Going Forward
The Greater Greenfield Community Foundation recently launched the RISE program to help cover the costs, co-pays or appointments of people looking to receive mental health services.
Jennifer Garside, the foundation’s director, said the community as a whole is still coping with mental health challenges from the disaster.
“You're sort of in those motions of you're in shock, and you're just trying to get through every day,” she said. "I think people are now — it's just catching up with them.”
Garside said over the past year the organization has been focused on individuals and families. This coming year, the foundation is focusing on community-wide projects like scoping out locations for new housing developments and funding a city manager position for the next two years.
Long term, the community still faces a housing shortage — an issue she said existed before the tornado due to the town being landlocked by farms — as well as financial strain from higher taxes and insurance coverage for the newly built houses.
“There's some people that feel like, with what they got for insurance, they can't afford to build,” she said. “So what do we do? There's not a lot of houses for sale. Do we have to leave the community? A lot don't want to do that.”
Garside said, based on advice from a city administrator of Parkersburg, which was devastated by a tornado in 2008, the foundation has also focused on programming for kids in Greenfield, like offering free movies, summer camps and installing new play structures.
“[He] said do some really nice things for your kids, because they have a very limited scope — they just know a bad thing happened, and it looks really ugly here. Now, do some fun things’ — and so we've been doing that.”
After the tornado hit last year, the Nodaway Valley School District received special permission from the state to end the school year early. Superintendent Paul Croghans said helping and working in the community after the disaster gave kids “an education most kids will never get” in community and service.
“It was a different way to end the school year — wouldn't wish it on anybody — but I think our kids came out bigger and better and stronger when it was all said and done,” he said.
Throughout the school year, Croghans said the district worked with parents to help displaced students stay at the school, whether through adjusted bus routes or by offering gas cards to families.
Still, managing student and staff PTSD and mental health, which could be easily triggered by things like sirens or stormy weather, remained a challenge. The school offered counseling services to help those affected and connected them with additional resources if needed. Croghans said just listening was also crucial.
“It's almost like a grieving process,” he said. “We see it in the smaller scale when it impacts a smaller group of people, but here it's everybody.”
As the district looks to end their school year next week, Croghans also will be finishing his 15th and final year with the district. After his retirement, he said he’s confident the school is going to continue with the progress it’s made.
“It's a success because we got through it to start with, but I think we're getting better and stronger.”
