Jacob Whalen wasn”t looking forward to a Christmas beneath a plastic tree. So he was thrilled to get a real tree from the Fort Bragg Food Bank, picking out a 6-foot pine that was the same size as the big Fort Bragg man.
“This is great. A plastic tree just doesn”t do it for me. When I was a kid, my grandfather and I used to go out in Reedley and cut a real Christmas tree,” said Whalen.
He couldn”t afford a tree at $20 and up and chose one of the smallest trees among some taller than 12 feet.
“I live in a trailer and so this is just the right size,” said Whalen.
Beyond the usual food for the community”s neediest residents, the Food Bank has some delicious surprises during the holidays. A new landowner in Little River donated 80 Christmas trees to the Food Bank, providing the latest treat. The Food Bank gave one tree for free to each client.
As I have been writing about the Food Bank for the past month, I have eaten food from there each week — except for the big holidays when everybody gets a turkey or ham. This Thanksgiving I took the whole bag home and found out what I had been missing.
The 12-pound bird, laid on the tabletop with the rest of the bag, was a true feast. I took the food out of the bag and found it filled the entire dinner table — and that was before cooking.
We all got a ham or turkey, plus fresh potatoes, onions, celery and oranges, cranberry sauce, stuffing, chicken broth, gravy mix, canned pumpkin, evaporated milk, flour, sugar, olives, and perhaps best loved of all, a bag of top quality Ugandan Thanksgiving coffee.
At the holidays, people living on the edge truly get to see how the other half lives.
No wonder the Food Bank served 625 client families on Thanksgiving — up 15 percent from last year. The Food Bank was packed all day Tuesday and Wednesday before Thanksgiving.
“After all the hard work of preparation, everything went smoothly — thanks to our dedicated volunteers and staff,” said Nancy Severy, Food Bank executive director.
“Jean Jones, our volunteer/client coordinator, once again performed the Herculean task of responding simultaneously to several clients and volunteers — not to mention a ringing telephone — continuously all day long — with grace and patience,” Severy said.
It was hard to imagine there was anything else going on in Fort Bragg, while mingling with the festive crowd of clients, volunteers and workers assigned by the courts spilling out of the building and filling the North Franklin Street parking lot. The line was a friendly place. Local people dropped off clothes, books, toys and household items.
One woman tried on shoes. Two men gave hollers when they found a new-appearing speaker telephone. People traded donated items as gifts as they waited in the long line.
The volunteers and staff at the Food Bank didn”t have much time to mix with the big crowd.
“Lance Nelson, our warehouse supervisor, with his characteristic energy and good will, directed and supported a large crew of hardworking and dedicated volunteers who got the job done in style,” Severy said. “We were joined by our board Vice President Howard Martin, who, for two days, faithfully helped distribute turkeys to clients. Our generous community supported us in so many ways.”
On Wednesday, turkey and donations were still flowing in as turkeys were going out in clients” holiday food bags. This meant a late run to the two local groceries that give the most to the Food Bank.
“Grocers Tom Honer of Harvest Market and Jim DiMauro at Safeway were most generous in helping us acquire the last minute turkeys we needed to be sure all our clients were served,” Severy said.
The Food Bank is backed by a joint effort of all the community”s non-profits, businesses, governments and churches.
“We were joined on this very lively day by the Kiwanis Club who took sign-ups for children”s Christmas gifts and by the small dog rescue people who applied flea treatment to Food Bank client dogs and gave away canned dog food,” Severy said.
A similar giveaway feast is planned, and a similar happy mob expected, on the days before Christmas at the Food Bank.
“The younger members of our community got in the act too,” Severy explained. “We received generous food donations collected and delivered by the 4-H club, from Three Rivers School and from the Boy Scouts. It was obvious that these kids took great care in bringing good food that will be appreciated by Food Bank client families.”
Community holiday spirit can be inspiring to watch at the Fort Bragg Food Bank. As I talked about Thanksgiving with Jones, she greeted each client by name as they approached the window, ran the computer and joked with two volunteers seated in her office.
As the group laughed and talked, a woman stopped her car in the street out front, came through the front door and into Jones” office. She handed Jones a $100 bill as a donation, turned and ran out the door.
She told Jones she needed to donate the money before she spent it.
“Our thanks go out to our community for a successful Thanksgiving distribution. We”d like to remind you that we still need your donations for our Christmas distribution and to help us throughout the coming year,” said Severy.
Season of Sharing
The goal of the Advocate-News and Mendocino Beacon”s annual Season of Sharing fund drive is to raise a substantial chunk of money that the Food Bank can draw on year-round, not just during the holidays when donations tend to flow most freely. Last year the community donated $37,214.15; this year”s target is $40,000.
The Community Foundation of Mendocino County administers the Season of Sharing free of charge as a courtesy to the newspapers, so every cent donated goes to the Food Bank.
Checks should be made out to the Community Foundation of Mendocino County (CFMC), and mailed to Advocate-News, P.O. Box 1188, Fort Bragg, 95437, or you”re welcome to bring them to the newspaper office, located at 450 N. Franklin St.
If you have any questions about our fund drive, call the newspapers at 964-5642. The fund-raiser runs through Dec. 31.
Donors” names are printed each week, unless they ask to remain anonymous.
Contributions received this week from Myra and Joseph Figueiredo, Frank and Shirley Collins, Marguerite Courtney, Boyd and Mary Kay Hight, Janice and Stephen Walker, Forest and Patricia Tilley, in memory of Nonie and Fred Grass, Rosemarie and Craig Walter and two anonymous donors, brought the total to $6,830.
