GRANT COUNTY, Wis. — The Grant County Sheriff’s Office has honored nursing student Callie Bartels with a Citizen Life-Saving Award after she helped a choking diner recover at a rural Wisconsin supper club.

WMTV 15 News reported Monday night that Bartels, a student at Southwest Technical College, was working as a waitress at the Louisburg Junction Supper Club when a man began choking during a Sunday afternoon meal.

Training turned into immediate action

Bartels performed the Heimlich maneuver, using training she had learned in a certified nursing assistant course six years earlier. WMTV reported that the intervention helped the diner recover.

The sheriff’s office recently presented Bartels with its Citizen Life-Saving Award. The local report did not identify the diner or provide medical details beyond the successful choking response, and ThinBlueNews is preserving that privacy boundary.

A sheriff’s recognition of community readiness

Citizen lifesaving awards highlight an important part of public safety: emergency response often begins before deputies, firefighters or paramedics can arrive. In this case, prior training gave a young community member the confidence to act when seconds mattered.

Bartels is a graduate of Platteville High School as well as a current nursing student, according to WMTV. Her recognition connects civilian preparedness with the sheriff’s office’s broader public-safety mission without implying that she is a law-enforcement employee.

Readers can find more source-backed service stories in ThinBlueNews’ deputy and sheriff hero stories, police hero stories and positive police news sections.

Source and visual disclosure

Visual note: WMTV’s report includes its own news video and imagery. ThinBlueNews did not copy those pixels because no reusable license was established. The featured image is an original editorial card, not a rescue image or award-presentation photograph.

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