The journey that led Dawn Manske to start Made For Freedom — a social enterprise that employs women from around the world who were victims of trafficking to make ethically sourced clothes and accessories — started with a pair of fisherman’s pants and some sandals.

The sandals were a wedding gift from her husband, Eric. The pants came from CeCe Hayes, an old friend who lived in Thailand.

“I had fallen in love with the sandals after reading the story behind them,” she said. They were made by women in Uganda who were earning money to get an education.”

The sandals introduced Manske to social enterprises.

As for the baggy fisherman’s pants her friend brought her from Thailand; they reminded her of the time she spent with Hayes teaching English in China.

During the 10 years she spent in the Chinese provinces of Beijing, Chengdu hoards of street children would beg her for money wherever she went.

“I started to get to know these kids and hear their stories,” said Manske, who is fluent in Mandarin Chinese. “Most of them came from very poor rural regions in China.”

“They had these ‘bosses’ that would take the children from their families, promising to take them to the big city and find them work, but instead they used them to get money,” she said. “We wouldn’t have called it trafficking then, but that’s exactly what they were doing. They were using them for slave labor.”

In addition to teaching English at the University, she would often visit the children at the local orphanage on the weekends. Much to her dismay, she discovered almost all of the orphans were little girls. Her experiences with the abandoned “girl children” at the orphanages left an indelible mark on Manske that eventually resurfaced when she reconnected with Hayes right before her wedding in 2008.

She recalled how, “We would go there and hold the kids because they were not receiving love and affection. During that time, I came to understand the devaluation of the girl child.”

“It opened my eyes to what makes people vulnerable to exploitation,” she said. “If a child does not feel that they are loved and they have no support, it opens them up to procurers and traffickers.”

While on her honeymoon, she got compliments on her sandals and pants from just about everyone they met, including one woman who liked her ensemble so much she chased Manske down in a parking lot in order to find out where she had purchased them.

“It got me thinking, maybe this could be a business based on the social enterprise model,” she said. “I have always had this desire to help people at risk, I just was never sure how to do it.”

By 2014, after years of planning, she had everything in place to open Made for Freedom. Sourced from 15 centers located in developing nations like India, Thailand and China, the jewelry, modified fisherman’s pants and accessories on Manske’s website — www.madeforfreedom.com — are crafted by women who have been rescued from traffickers.

Manske is particularly proud of Made for Freedom’s T-shirts. The organic cotton shirts are made by women in Calcutta, Indi, who have been rescued from the re- light district in Songucha, where 11,000 women are trapped in the sex trade by traffickers.

Manske is in Huntsville this week pushing her wares at the 34th International Symposium on Child Abuse, a registration-only event currently taking place at the Von Braun Center South Hall.

Attending symposiums like the one at the VBC is just one of the many ways Manske sells the jewelry and clothing that provides dignified employment to women who were once considered slaves.

Her website provides a full catalog of the jewelry, accessories and clothing available through the social enterprise.

Made for Freedom products can also be found in local stores in the St. Louis, Missouri area where Manske lives.

“The more I can get the word out about Made for Freedom, the more women we can help, the more hours of dignified employment we can provide,” she said.