Former RoughRiders Parent Delivers Light into the Dark

CEDAR RAPIDS — They filter in and out of this community on a yearly basis, but most Cedar Rapids RoughRiders players will never forget their brief time here. That’s in a good way.

The same goes for their parents.

That’s why you saw Marcel Wolthers pull up in a rental truck last week to the Iowa Derecho Relief Center at the Armar Plaza in Cedar Rapids with box after box after box of flashlights he wanted to donate to those without electrical power and in need.

“It seemed like the nice thing to do,” Wolthers said. “My son played here, and he had a great experience. We know a lot of people here.”

Ethan Wolthers played right wing for the RoughRiders in the 2018-19 season. He was in the British Columbia Junior Hockey League last season and is a freshman this year at the University of Massachusetts.

The family is from Valencia, Calif., and that’s where Marcel Wolthers originally began his travels last week before eventually coming to the aid of Cedar Rapidians. He drove with a niece and nephew to the University of Oklahoma to help them move in for the school year, and that’s where he found out about the devastation a derecho storm had done to the city.

Wolthers has been in the entertainment industry in Hollywood for 30 years as an engineer and in post-production, among other things. His current professional position is Director of Theatrical QC Operations at Pixelogic Media.

But he’s also an entrepreneur who developed several styles of what he labels the Xstreem LED flashlight.