Lending A Hand: 100 Pretty Purses For Female Veterans

FRANKFORT, IL — Homelessness is an epidemic that can strike any person at virtually any time. One particular group that faces an increased threat of homelessness is veterans. And in that group exists a subgroup: female veterans.

In its 2020 Annual Homeless Assessment Report to Congress, the U.S.Department of Housing and Urban Development estimated that there are 3,126 homeless female veterans.

One Frankfort resident has dedicated the last seven years to helping raise awareness of and providing support to homeless female veterans through her nonprofit group 100 Pretty Purses For Female Veterans. The organization is hosting its annual 100 Pretty Purses event from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday at the Frankfort Park District, 140 Oak St.

The theme for this year’s event is “Come and Be Celebrated.” Registration is free, but is limited to 100 female veteran participants.

Yvette Jones-Swanson, a U.S. Army veteran who was once homeless herself, is the founder of 100 Pretty Purses For Female Veterans. The experience of going from couch to couch to eventually a woman’s shelter made Jones-Swanson realize that there were many things, essential things for basic living, that she just didn’t have. Things like toiletries, socks, hats and scarves.

“Those were some very difficult times,” Jones-Swanson said. “... That was a real dark time in my life.”

Jones-Swanson would later go on to pursue her real estate license and work toward helping other homeless women find housing, which she still does today. That calling led her to want to help female homeless veterans, she said.

“As time progressed, more opportunities arose,” she said. “I had the opportunity to go to the V.A. and speak to groups of women who were in situations like I was: domestic violence and they’re also homeless.”

Jones-Swanson soon made it a habit to bring a purse or two filled with essentials along with her when she would speak with homeless female veterans, which she would give to one or two women there.

But bringing only one or two purses along wasn’t enough for Jones-Swanson. She decided to take to social media and ask her friends if they could help by donating additional purses and items that she could hand out on her visits. Her friends responded.

“I got a phone call from an organization in Park Forest, and they said, ‘I've got 50 purses, brand new purses, that the families here in the nursing home want to fill before we give them to you,’” Jones-Swanson said. “I’m thinking, ‘Oh my God, what am I going to do with 50 purses?’ I’m thinking to myself that I’m going to be at the V.A. all day just finding women to give purses to. No, that’s too much.”

As fate would have it, that was the same time in 2015 that Jones-Swanson was asked by the Village of Park Forest to be the vice-chairman of the Veterans Commission. Now she had a broader avenue to reach more female veterans.

“I said, ‘Oh, thank goodness.’ Now I could just have this event in Park Forest with the Veterans Commission being the supporter,” Jones-Swanson said.

But, now she would need more than 50 purses, and so she again reached out for donations, and again people responded. Jones-Swanson ended up giving out about 300 Pretty Purses for that inaugural event, each filled with items. And 100 Pretty Purses has grown each year since.

Jones-Swanson continued 100 Pretty Purses in Park Forest for the next five years. In 2020, she moved to Frankfort and continued the tradition, only by then her 100 Pretty Purses event gave away about 1,500 purses.

Jones-Swanson said she is optimistic about the future of 100 Pretty Purses and the future for female veterans despite — or, perhaps, because of — the challenges she's faced in the past.

"You know, I'm still happy. I'm still happy," she said. "I'm still able to serve others, and that's what it's all about."

For more information on Saturday’s 100 Pretty Purses event, or to learn how to donate, visit the 100 Pretty Purses website.

For more news and information like this, subscribe to the Frankfort Patch for free. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app; download the free Patch Android app here. Don't forget to like us on Facebook!