In a little corner under a tree out front of First United Methodist Church in Crown Point, there sits a little statue of a white deer.
The statue — a replica of Snow, an albino doe that so many residents on the south side of the city came to love in the eight years she was alive — is a monument to her, of course, but also what she represents, said the Rev. Mark Wilkins, the church’s senior pastor. And that, he said, is a sense of community in a world that often seems hard and cold.
She may not have created kindness, but she sure brought it out in people, Crown Point City Councilman Joe Sanders, R-5, said.
“I’ve never eulogized a deer before, but this is bigger than that,” he said. “This is about community. All strong Midwesterners say ‘Please’ and ‘Thank you,’ so we’re celebrating ourselves as kind and caring.
“Yes, this is about memorializing a deer, but it’s also about community and bringing people together.”
Community is much more than a set of geographical points, Wilkins said. Yes, there were people who said the doe was “just an animal,” but she became a thread that brought people together.
“She was this simple, gentle presence in our life that brightened our days,” Wilkins said. “Maybe she was just a warm spot in our lives, so we say ‘Thank you’ for the opportunity to have those memories.”
Snow was euthanized on April 1 after she was hit by a car and her injuries were too severe for her to be released back in the wild.
Pat Thomas and her partner, Jerry Nibert, more than a few times caught Snow lounging by their air conditioner, Nibert said. He often fed her apples, which made him the favorite.
“She’d walk across the yard, and it was like she knew he was the one who gives me apples. We got to pet her head,” Thomas said. “She sure brought people a lot of smiles.”
Tanya Osborne, who read a poem she wrote about the doe, described how one day, she happened to look out her window and saw Snow in her yard. Snow approached the window, she said, and the two stood “nose-to-nose.”
“We were looking at each other, and she just had this calm, wonderful look on her face,” Osborne said.
After the service, Wilkins took to blessing all manner of pets most of the more than 100 attendees brought with them. Linda Martis, who used to work for the church, brought Gia, her small-yet-rambunctious Collie.
“She’s a talker, so you might need to give her an extra blessing,” Martis joked to Wilkins.
Jen Price, on the other hand, wanted the blessing to give her giant rabbit, Thumper, some peace.
“She was dumped in Cedar Lake, and of all my animals, she’s the most skittish,” Price said.
Kate Hodson, a Hebron-based equine veterinarian, previously told the Post-Tribune that everything possible was done to save the beloved deer, but her injuries were too grave for her to live a normal life without suffering. Snow was an 8-year-old deer who was overweight and generally unafraid of humans.
If she were able to recover, Hodson said she would not have been able to be released back into Crown Point since she was slightly domesticated. They were unable to find a wildlife sanctuary facility able to house an adult deer instead of a fawn, she said.
Still, the deer brought people together.
“I think she served her purpose. I think that’s why God put her in this world. It wasn’t to be a white deer and stand out. It’s to show people do still have compassion in a world so cold that we see every day,” Hodson said.
Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
Post-Tribune staff writer Carrie Napoleon contributed.
