99-year-old woman knits Christmas hats for child victims of domestic violence: ‘I like the idea of giving it away more’

With a wicker basket of handmade hats by her side, Ada Spanier eased into her living room wingback chair and began knitting another one.

At age 99, her hands were still nimble as she wove the yarn with her needles.

“It’s very easy,” she said.

Spanier doesn’t knit for leisure; she does it to give back and help those in need.

“I like the idea of making it,” she said, referring to the hats. “But I like the idea of giving it away more. Someone else is going to have it.”

She won’t even knit for her great-grandchildren.

“They don’t need hats,” Spanier said about her great-grandchildren. “I only give hats to the children who have no other source for Christmas and pleasure.”

This year, Spanier knitted dozens of hats for children living with their mother or father at a shelter run by the WINGS Program for people who have been victims of domestic violence.

It was all smiles on a recent afternoon when the large basket of Spanier’s handmade knitted hats were delivered to a WINGS safe house where domestic violence survivors live with their children.

Two twin girls, age 2, rummaged through the basket searching for the right hat. With so many colors to choose from, they were indecisive.

Ultimately, they selected almost identical lavender hats that matched the shirts they were wearing.

“Most of the families that come to WINGS, come here with nothing,” said Rebecca Darr, CEO of WINGS. “And in the winter, we’re always scrambling for hats, gloves and scarves.”

One of the young girls who received a hat recorded a thank-you video for Spanier, who wasn’t able to make the trip to the safe house.

Spanier was born in the New York borough of Brooklyn and lived in several states over the years, with her last job working in a museum in Berkeley, California, until she was 91.

She and her husband came to Chicago to be closer to their son, who lives in the Chicago area. They moved into a Hyde Park nursing home six years ago, and her husband died not long after.

Spanier started knitting in her early 20s but didn’t start knitting for others until eight or nine years ago.

While living in California, she decided to send 42 pairs of mittens to an orphanage, she said.

Nowadays, Spanier enjoys knitting while watching television, or attending a lecture or one of her nursing home’s programs. But no matter where she goes, she always keeps her wool and knitting needles handy.

“I go to many places, and I always keep my knitting with me,” she said. And if the program she is attending is boring, she pulls out her tools.

“They never complain to me because I’m a nice old lady,” she said.

This year, it took Spanier about 10 months to knit the hats she donated to WINGS.

The basket taken to the shelter contained hats of all colors, many of them striped: red and white; yellow, lime green and salmon; purple and white; maroon and white; purple, yellow and white.

“You want some life in it,” Spanier said about the colored hats she knitted.

It’s seeing people use the hats that really makes her happy, she said.

“But everything looks cute because there’s a head in here,” she said. “The heads make everything beautiful.”

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