Fundraiser slated for student veteran scholarship
Legion hosts event for cause created by mother of Towson man killed in Iraq
When Tracy Miller looked out the peephole of the door at her Towson home and saw two Marines in dress uniforms, she knew her son was gone.
The Marines had come that 2004 night to deliver the news that Cpl. Nick Ziolkowski, a 2001 graduate of the Boys’ Latin School of Maryland, had been killed in Fallujah, Iraq, by an enemy sniper. Ziolkowski, 22, had enlisted in the Marine Corps shortly after graduation, fulfilling a childhood dream.
“I opened the door, and I’ll tell you, I just yelled,” Miller said.
In 2006, Miller, an academic adviser at Towson University, created a scholarship fund in her son’s memory for Towson University student veterans and others who have tried to make the world a better place.
The Nick Ziolkowski Memorial Endowment issued its first award, $900, in 2008. It has now issued more than $30,000 in scholarships, according to university officials.
This year’s award will be $5,000, divided between two students.
For the first time, a fundraiser for the scholarship fund will be held on Sunday at the Towson American Legion Post 22. The veterans group will host a Super Bowl party from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. with food from Mission BBQ, beer, wine, soda and games at Tracy Miller sits with photos of her son, Marine Cpl. Nicholas Ziolkowski, killed in Iraq in 2004. Miller created a scholarship in his memory at Towson University, where she works. the Towson American Legion’s Grand Hall.
American Legion member John Ruffer said the veterans’ organization often holds fundraisers to help the community. The group voted recently to donate $500 to the endowment fund, but members decided it wasn’t enough.
“It just didn’t feel right,” said Ruffer, a former Marine. “It felt like we were giving from the wallet and not the heart.”
Members reached out to Towson University’s Student Veterans Group to find out what else could be done. They decided they could donate the use of their rental hall on a day when it typically goes unused — Super Bowl Sunday — and make money for the scholarship fund in the process.
“Now we [can] build community awareness to the scholarship and hopefully gain some support for our veterans,” Ruffer said. “They have already earned it.”
Known to his friends as “Ski,” Ziolkowski is remembered for his charisma and willingness to help others, according to Butch Maisel, one of his former teachers.
Maisel, an upper school history teacher at Boys’ Latin, is also the curator of the Boys’ Latin Center for Military History. Opened last April, the military museum showcases artifacts from the Revolutionary War through 2018 and highlights the achievements of students of the all-boys school.
Prominent in the display is an exhibit about Ziolkowski that features his Marine uniform and pictures of the former student.
Maisel said Ziolkowski lives on “everywhere” at the school today through the exhibit, a military section of the library and a portion of the lacrosse field named after him.
The scholarship is a way to continue his legacy, he said.
“It’s such a great legacy of a young man that did the right thing,” Maisel said. “Every step of his life was positive. If you want to perpetuate that sort of student or person, and if Nick’s memory can help to do that, it’s a great place to put your money.”
Tickets for the Nick Ziolkowski Memorial Endowment fundraiser are $25 in advance and $30 at the door.