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Good Neighbors send thanks

To the editor:

Once again, the Wintersville Good Neighbors Christmas Program was a great success, due to all of the assistance Linda and I have from the local churches, schools, businesses, civic clubs, social clubs and many private citizens who volunteer to help.

In 1959, Ruth Cunningham organized a group of teachers at Wintersville Elementary School to help five little girls who were in need of clothing. In 2024, our organization was able to help 64 families with 150 children have a very merry Christmas with food, gifts and store cards.

As always, our forever faithful toy coordinator, Kitty Ferguson, spent weeks of countless hours, directing the organizing, sorting and wrapping of all of the toys and gifts for children.

A very special thanks to the students of Cross Creek Elementary School, who collected hundreds of canned goods, brought them to the church, sorted them and placed them on the appropriate tables. We also were blessed with a large donation from the Cross Creek Elementary penny drive.

Thanks to the students from the Jefferson County Christian School and the Wintersville Methodist Church Youth Group who, along with volunteers from the community, helped wrap all of the donated toys.

Thanks to Deborah Oberman and the USMC Toys for Tots program, which donated a large assortment of beautiful new toys, and to Ken Cornish for organizing the delivery to shut-ins and the elderly. A great thank you goes out to all of the young men and women who spent the day carrying out and loading the many boxes into the cars of the families.

Thanks to the large group of members from the Word of Life Fellowship and the Youth Group, along with other volunteers who came out on Friday night to pack all of the boxes. Thanks to the businesses in Wintersville, including Kroger, Big Lots and Dollar General, that allowed us to place our toy drop-off boxes in their stores.

Special recognition goes to Sandy Wilson from Word of Life, who prepared a beautiful gift for each mother, grandmother or other woman who came in to pick up their Christmas packages.

We would like to recognize those who gave large monetary, toy and gift donations: Wintersville Methodist Church; Wintersville Methodist Modern Eve; Word of Life Fellowship; Starkdale Presbyterian Church; Wintersville Fire and Rescue; Wintersville American Legion Post 557; Cross Creek Elementary PTO; Cub Scout Den 415; Secret Santa; GF/WC Wintersville Woman’s Club; Russ and Sandy Grimm; Mary Kay Schuetz; Tom and Lori Galbreath; and Mary Beth Allen.

God bless.

Jerry Boyd

Wintersville Good Neighbors

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