Story by Susan Gallagher
No one at the centers where he regularly donates platelets has any idea that Mike Weidhaas speaks French and fluent German, lived overseas for several years, holds a pilot’s license and serves regularly as a poll worker in St. Louis City and County elections.
But it is the eye-popping 800 times this American Red Cross donor has given blood that also distinguishes Mike. He has donated over 100 gallons, beginning in 1967 when, as an 18-year-old freshman at Parks College (now part of St. Louis University), he needed parental approval to make his first donation. Mike returned to donate blood a few more times during his college years.
Then military service intervened. After earning a bachelor’s degree in Aeronautical Administration in 1969, Mike joined the U. S. Air Force and was stationed for three years in Frankfurt, Germany—only six miles from the U.S. Military Hospital where he was born.
Germany was a homeland of sorts in other ways. “My dad was born in St. Louis, but my paternal grandfather immigrated from Germany and married my grandmother who was from Kirkwood, MO. And during World War II, my father was a “Richie Boy” (a translator for German prisoners of war),” Mike recalled. “In France in 1944, my dad met his future wife. Her entire family was raised in St Mihiel, in the Lorraine area of France.”
Mike’s parents married in 1947 in France and lived in the Frankfurt area with Mike and his three sisters. When Mike was 9 years old, the family traveled by U.S. military ship from Bremerhaven (Germany) to Hoboken, NJ. A year later, Mike started fourth grade in St Louis.
Following his military service in Germany, Mike spent a year in New York City, where he worked at Kennedy International Airport for a Spanish charter airline. In 1975 upon the death of his father, Mike returned to St. Louis to take over his parent’s travel business. He married and raised three children---a teacher, an accountant and a professional pilot-turned lawyer.
And in the early 1980s, when Mike signed up to donate blood again, a Red Cross phlebotomist discovered that he is CMV negative. “She asked me to donate platelets,” he recalled. “And I’ve been mostly donating platelets since.”
CMV (cytomegalovirus) is a common flu-like virus that up to 85% of U.S. adults have been exposed to by the age of 40. CMV can be quite serious---even fatal---for babies who have no defense against the virus and for people with weakened immune systems. Thanks to donors like Mike Weidhaas, the American Red Cross can supply these critically needed platelets to hospitals throughout the nation.
Mike’s platelets have not only gone to St. Louis area hospitals but to medical facilities in Kentucky and Pennsylvania when supplies in Missouri are sufficient. Platelet donors with 20 or more annual donations are recognized by the American Red Cross with a plaque at the Red Cross donor center.
Because he is very aware of the critical need, Mike tries to donate every two weeks. As a result of the vastly reduced number of donors and blood drives during the pandemic, the American Red Cross has warned that the nation, and the St. Louis region, are facing a blood crisis—the worst in more than a decade. While Mike does not push his family members to join him in making donations, he has a sister living in Seal Beach, CA, he has recruited to be a whole blood donor.
“I know it is critical to give now,” Mike said. “Blood is something that saves lives and that cannot be artificially created. If I can help someone else, I want to. I see making donations as just part of my civic duty.”
While Mike has been frequently honored as one of the top blood donors in the St. Louis, he’s equally proud of another recent honor: “I am a proud member of the Ted Drewes Frozen Custard Hall of Fame---Class of 2020.”
The 93-year-old home of the “World’s Best Ice Cream” recognizes and honors customers who have been visiting the take-out spot for 30 or more years.
Custard runs deep in Mike’s family. When his parents moved to St. Louis County, their house abutted the home of Ted Drewes, Jr.— son of the founder. Now Mike lives across the street from the custard mecca in South St. Louis. He and his six grandchildren visit the St. Louis institution often—requesting dry ice with every order of custard.
“No one at Ted Drewes has asked why a guy who lives across the street needs dry ice to protect his custard from melting on the way home,” Mike said, laughing. “We use the dry ice for a little science experiment: the kids drop the dry ice in a dish of warm water and dish detergent to create a massive cloud of steam and bubbles. My grandkids love the experiment—and the custard, too!