Roadside delivery

IOWA CITY - An Eastern Iowa father delivered the fifth member of his family along a gravel road late Tuesday morning.

Jeremiah Hoylman, a volunteer firefighter in Keokuk County, said his wife, Ashley, gave birth less than an hour after her water broke, forcing him to make the delivery.

“He took his shirt off and wrapped the baby with his shirt,” said Ashley Hoylman, 28. “Then he took the drawstring from my pants and wrapped it around my umbilical cord.”

The couple was trying to get to Mercy Iowa City, where Ashley planned to give birth.

“You hear about (similar stories), but you never want to be part of it,” Ashley said. “Now we are.”

At 11:42 a.m. the couple welcomed Brecken, a healthy baby boy, into the world. Then the three of them waited for an ambulance at the intersection of M Avenue and 260th Street in rural Iowa County.

“We didn't want to deliver our own baby - nobody wants to deliver their own baby - but you have to do what you have to do,” Ashley said.

An Iowa County emergency dispatcher helped coach Jeremiah, 30, through the delivery.

“I'm going to find her name and go thank her personally,” said Jeremiah. “It was two pushes, and he was out.”

The Hoylmans plan to return to their home in Keokuk County by the end of the week. Brecken is the couple's third child, joining 22-month-old and 3-year-old sisters.

“Those births seemed pretty normal,” Jeremiah said. “Everyone was saying the third one can come faster.”

Brecken must have been listening.