Mom of boy killed in Joplin tornado wants empty chair at graduation
Tammy Niederhelman said as soon as her youngest son entered kindergarten, he considered himself a Joplin Eagle.
He would have been part of the Class of 2016.
But Zachary Allen Williams, who loved school and planned to become a nurse, didn't live long enough to finish middle school. He was killed almost five years ago, at age 12, when a monster tornado ripped through Joplin on the evening of May 22, 2011.
This May, Joplin's Class of 2016 will graduate without Zachary. His mother asked the school district to save a spot for her boy, an empty chair where his cap and gown can hang. She also asked that his name be called at graduation.
"I'll never see my son graduate, I know that. I'll never see him get married. I'll never hold my grandchildren," Niederhelman told the News-Leader. "This is very important to me — to have a seat for him."
Her request was rejected.
Niederhelman refuses to give up. In December, she made a plea to the Joplin school board and met, for nearly an hour, with Joplin Principal Kerry Sachetta. Neither meeting went her way.
"Our current and longstanding practice is to recognize students who pass away at any point while attending Joplin High School by announcing their names and holding a moment of silence to honor them during the graduation ceremony," Sachetta wrote in a post on the high school website. "We have recognized 10 high school students in this manner over the last several years."
She said Joplin school officials have told her it's against policy to allow the empty chair at graduation, so she created a petition on Change.org to ask that the district change its policy.
Joplin High School Principal and Joplin Schools Superintendent: Save One for Zach
As of midday Friday, there were more than 4,300 signatures.
"Zach is still very much alive in our hearts and forever a member of the Joplin High Class of 2016. Please help us get this policy changed," Niederhelman wrote in the petition. "No parent should ever have to beg, plead, and fight for their deceased student to be honored with their own seat at graduation and for their name to be called.
"Zach will not sit in the seat as he should have but he was, is, and always will be a Joplin Eagle Class of 2016."
She said Joplin school officials have told her there are plans to mark the five-year anniversary of the storm during the ceremony and to remember the 161 people who were killed, including her son.
"Zach has been one of those numbers since the tornado," she said. "He is the only student that passed away that stormy May day that would graduate in 2016."
The Sunday evening of the tornado, Zach was at home at 20th Street and Texas Avenue. He was last seen in the bathroom.
As the storm sirens wailed, Zach spoke with his mother, by phone, one last time. She was working the night shift at Freeman Hospital.
"He said 'Mommy, I'm so scared,'" Niederhelman told the News-Leader in the days after the storm. "I told him I loved him and that everything would be fine."
Following the storm, Zach's mom, her husband and dozens of volunteers searched for the boy. His body was identified days later.
Andrew Williams, Zach's older brother, was 15 years old when the tornado killed his brother. Now 21, he is a member of the U.S. Marine Corps stationed at North Carolina's Camp Lejeune.
The former Joplin High School student told the News-Leader that his unit will deploy soon and he is baffled that his alma mater has not yet honored his mother's request. "They should at least do something," he said.
Niederhelman and her husband have adopted two young girls, ages 2 and 7. They help her focus on tomorrow.
"No one could take away the pain, the mourning. I'll always miss Zach," she said. "They help fill the emptiness."
Niederhelman said Sachetta, who was principal of the high school during the tornado, offered to put a plant on the stage for her son, a suggestion she found "insulting."
"This school year would have been Zach's senior year. He loved school and was anxious to go to college," she wrote in the petition. "He had dreams of the future, friends that were also his classmates and a love for life and God."
Niederhelman said she doesn't understand the opposition to the empty chair. She said it doesn't hurt anybody or cost anything.
Norm Ridder, the interim superintendent in Joplin, said the decision was made at the high school and "students helped with that decision." In a lengthy post on the high school website, Sachetta said the district plans to mark the five-year anniversary of the tornado at graduation with a moment of silence and displaying names of Joplin students and staff who were killed.
Sachetta said he sought feedback from current students and staff and they "overwhelmingly" supported including Zach in the anniversary recognition but not allowing the empty chair.
"Our hearts and thoughts are with this family and all of those throughout our district who have lost a child," he wrote. "There is not a more difficult event to imagine."
Niederhelman said she is supportive of the high school's decision to mark the anniversary but doesn't understand why her request cannot also be honored.
"They keep making it about the tornado," she said. "But if he'd died in a car accident or had leukemia, I would have still been asking for a seat."
She said where she grew up, in tiny Summersville — with a population of about 500 — it was a practice to leave an open seat for students who didn't live long enough to graduate with classmates.
"It shows compassion for the family, for those who are still mourning," she said.
Georgianna Waters Diener is one of the many residents in the Joplin area who have offered their support for Niederhelman's request. Diener said she never met Zachary, but, as a mother herself, she understands the request.
"I cannot see any district denying a mother," Diener said.
Diener and others have expressed interest in staging a "civil protest" every month until graduation. "I will protest in February, March and April until this is changed," she said.
The Joplin High School graduation is on the campus of Missouri Southern State University. The ceremony had just concluded that day in May 2011, when the deadly storm started making its way through the city.
If the Joplin school district doesn't change its policy regarding the seat before this year's graduation ceremony, Niederhelman said she'll stand outside — in protest — next to an empty chair for her son.
"If they are not going to honor him with a seat inside, we'll have one outside," she said. "He'll have a seat one way or another."