Ivy Olson, 60; Charity Founder Inspired Pilot of ‘Touched by an Angel’
Ivy Olson, 60, the founder of a Hawaii charity whose story inspired the pilot of the television series “Touched by an Angel,” died of intestinal cancer Sunday.
In 1989, Olson founded Angel Network Charities, which became a $700,000-a-year nonprofit serving more than 100 homeless families in Hawaii. The organization helps its clients gain the means to live independently through housing, health care, transportation and job training assistance.
Olson was chosen as one of President George H.W. Bush’s “Thousand Points of Light” in 1992.
She launched the charity after an experience many years ago when she was a single divorced mother of two. She had taken her sons to a park for a Thanksgiving dinner of three hot dogs, but they were still hungry. As they approached their apartment, a woman emerged saying, “Oh, honey? I’ve been waiting for you.’” The woman invited them in for a generous meal and sent them home with leftovers.
When Olson tried to return the plastic containers that had held the leftovers, she found an empty apartment. The manager told her no one had lived there in months. Olson decided that she had been helped by an angel.
Writers from “Touched by an Angel” wrote her story into the pilot of the CBS series in 1994.
Start your day right
Sign up for Essential California for news, features and recommendations from the L.A. Times and beyond in your inbox six days a week.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
