For the holidays, Keystone Military Families in Shoemakersville shipped 7,500 Stockings for Soldiers to deployed military personnel and will be hosting a Christmas Shop with Santa and donating Christmas dinner boxes to military families, all made possible by donations and the efforts of local volunteers.
Donations have been pouring into Keystone Military Families, a volunteer nonprofit organization that helps military personnel, veterans and military families.
“I hope it brings home the point that there are many people who have so much less than most of us and it doesn’t take a whole lot to help these families,” said Keystone Military Families founder, director and volunteer Kyle Lord, of Ruscombmanor Township. “One person really can make a huge difference in somebody’s life.”
About 7,500 Christmas stockings of snacks, toiletries, socks, hats, gloves were shipped out over this past weekend to Pennsylvania military personnel, including those from Berks County. The Christmas Shop, held this week, offers new or gently used items, toiletries, toys, gift sets, and stuffed animals to the food pantry families who cannot afford to shop for Christmas gifts. On Dec. 19, the children can shop for their parents and visit with Santa. Christmas dinner boxes will be given to food pantry families.
“I think we pretty much have Christmas spirit here all year. I’d like to see more people keep that spirit through the whole year to carry forward the fact that people remember to check on these veterans or to help out wherever they can,” said Lord.
Ginny Hartman of Lenhartsville and Syvanna Hoppes of Shoemakersville were among the volunteers who stuffed stockings last week for deployed military personnel. Hartman’s son is a veteran.
“This way I’m giving back to the other veterans and to the guys who are currently over serving for us so they know they’re not forgotten at the holidays.”
Hoppes, who also has a family member who served, really enjoys volunteering at Keystone Military Families, “Coming in and helping and knowing that it’s going to a good cause and someone’s going to enjoy what we’re doing.”
Keystone Military Families does not receive any federal or state funding, nor does it qualify to gain assistance from a food bank because Keystone serves a specific group of people. Veterans Affairs helps when they can, said Lord.
“My mission is the military because they are the most under served in most cases,” said Lord. “Most of our veterans are from Bernville to Boyertown and then up to Schuylkill County. Everything is anonymous. They show their military ID and they get what they need. They wouldn’t be here if they had the income to go buy food.”
Lord said donations have been numerous, naming just a few recent drop offs.
“We have enough to make it work. People have been incredibly generous and gracious about helping us out. When you think about everything that goes in here and out of here, it’s a little overwhelming sometimes,” said Lord. “We have 60 families a week that we’re feeding right now. We gave out 81 Thanksgiving dinners and we’re planning on giving out probably close to 100 Christmas dinners.”
Blue Ridge Communications News personality Peter Taraborelli assisted the members of the 733rd Transportation Company of the Army Reserve to load the troop transport truck with donations for Keystone Military Families. Items were collected at the Blue Ridge offices statewide for the annual Stockings for Soldiers.
“They brought in 4,000 pounds last week and there was more dropped off at their offices and they brought that in today,” said Lord.
Veterans Coalition of Pennsylvania of Reading held a food drive to help with the Christmas dinner boxes, donating a couple hundred pounds of food.
“Which is great,” said Lord with a smile. “They’re like a resource center just like we are and we work together so we can better take care of the veterans that are in need.”
Vietnam veteran John Welter Jr. of Reading donated a van load of children’s toys for the Christmas Shop.
During the Item’s visit to the packing center last week, Cabela’s in Hamburg dropped off donations of toiletries, dried soups, protein bars, books and more, much of which was used for Stockings for Soldiers.
The Cabela’s donation collection, called Operation Pay it Forward, was part of Cabela’s Outfitter Engagement Week (Cabela’s employees are called outfitters) for the Hamburg store’s operations, hard lines and soft lines departments. They chose Keystone Military Families as their collection recipient this year after reading about them in the Hamburg Item. Those involved in the collection included Jess Strohl, Harold Engleman and Mary Arlene Swope, Ron Leh, Victor Ahearne, Melissa LaRocca, Scott Johns and Stephanie McGowan, as well as the outfitters in their departments.
“We want to show the community that Cabela’s cares,” said Ron Leh, retail marketing manager. “It’s not just about what we’re selling, it’s about what we’re giving back to the community.”
“I think it’s nice that we can give back to the community and give back to our military who are overseas and are not with their families,” said Melissa LaRocca, Cabela’s customer experience manager. “It’s nice to pay it forward.”
Stephanie McGowan, Cabela’s senior operations, said giving the donation was fabulous.
“Any time that you can give back or show respect for those that have already served and can’t make ends meet (is great),” said McGowan. “They’ve done so much for us, it’s about time we did something for them.”
Scott Johns, Cabela’s general manager, is happy that “Outfitters had an opportunity to take care of the military families that take care of us. It’s a good project.”
Victor Ahearne, Cabela’s asset protection manager, believes the biggest impact, outside what is going directly to military personnel, is the fact that Keystone Military Families are helping the children of military families.
“It’s going to go right to the kids of those military (personnel) who are not there for Christmas. That’s the piece that tugs on my heartstrings, when you can help out the little ones (of those) who are going to fight for our rights,” said Ahearne.
“Military families serve as much as the actual soldiers do because they become instant single parents and they have to worry about someone who is thousands of miles away in a zone where anything can happen,” said Lord, whose son has been deployed five times.
Lord explained that the 100 percent volunteer nonprofit organization started as Keystone Soldiers in 2002 in Fleetwood when her son’s unit was first deployed, sending care packages to deployed soldiers and assisting military families. In 2014, Keystone reorganized as Keystone Military Families to change the focus to military personnel, veterans and military families and moved into a packing center in Shoemakersville, expanding the food pantry.
“The returning troops who are waiting for medical determinations and families that lost jobs during deployments, it’s hard for them to get by,” said Lord. “They can come in and get food, clothing, furniture and household goods, anything they need to help them get by, so that what money they do have they can use to pay bills.”
The Keystone Military Families Food Pantry is open year round to military families, showing a military ID or copy of DD214, on Tuesday, Wednesday and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Keystone Military Families also serves as a resource for military families, including access to counseling, budgeting classes, cooking classes and connect with financial resources for heating or electric.
Keystone Military Families continues to need donations of food and toiletries.
For more information, visit facebook.com/KeystoneMilitaryFamilies.
