Irmgard Hormann says that growing up as the daughter of a Honolulu minister, she and her family welcomed needy people into their home for something to eat, whether they walked in off the street or just couldn’t make ends meet.

"We always had someone in the kitchen," she said. "That was the way it was."

Hormann has been following her parents’ example since 1979, lending a hand in feeding thousands of people through the Hawaii Meals on Wheels program.

Hormann was a retired librarian at age 62 when she organized the Lutheran Church of Honolulu’s first program to deliver food to the homebound. It later became incorporated as Hawaii Meals on Wheels.

Now 95, Hormann will be honored as Hawaii Meals on Wheels’ founder at the program’s annual fundraising dinner Thursday night at the Willows restaurant.

The nonprofit program, funded by donors, will deliver more than 80,000 meals this year, says Claire Shima­bukuro, the program’s executive director.

(Hawaii Meals on Wheels is not related to Lanakila Meals on Wheels, a larger program run by Lanakila Pacific that also delivers hot meals to homebound people, Shimabukuro said.)

At the Lutheran church — where Hormann’s father, the Rev. Arthur Hormann, was minister for some 30 years — Hawaii Meals on Wheels began with just six clients on two routes in Makiki and Moiliili, six volunteers and $25, Shimabukuro said. Several churches in the area soon joined in to help deliver food, prepared by hospital, care home or commercial kitchen vendors.

Today, the organization’s 400 volunteers serve more than 600 homebound elderly or disabled people along 46 routes on Oahu, she said. The volunteers include a couple in their 90s, Ken and Alice Chun, who have been with the program from the beginning.

"Our volunteers are the sweetest people," Hormann said.

On days when they weren’t helping HMOW, Hormann and longtime volunteer Mary Reese cooked and delivered meals for the Institute for Human Services for about 15 years.

"I was always cutting coupons and looking for bargains on frozen chicken," she said. "You’d think I was a good cook, but I’m not."

One time, two big pots of spaghetti spilled over in the back of her old Toyota station wagon. "I couldn’t get that smell out of the car," she said.

Hormann also has volunteered for the Friends of the Library and Faith in Service of Humanity. She was named Outstanding Senior Volunteer at the mayor’s annual Senior Citizen Recognition Program in 2010.

Hormann said it is "truly amazing" how far Hawaii Meals on Wheels has evolved since it was just a little church committee. She said she never expected the program would develop into an important social support system for people who are shut in and isolated.

"That’s one of the most wonderful aspects of this whole program, that lives can be saved," she said.

Shimabukuro said that as many as 10 times a year, a Meals on Wheels volunteer will be the one to answer a cry for help from someone who is injured, or has become too ill or weak to come to the door. Their clients are often people without family or friends nearby, and the volunteer "becomes their ohana," the person they can look forward to connecting with once a day, she said. In one case an elderly man had fallen, but "he hung on because he knew Meals on Wheels was coming," Shimabukuro said.