Published: Friday, November 26, 2010, 5:00 AM
Efforts to spread Thanksgiving cheer to the needy kept an army of volunteers busy Thursday morning - though in one curious case, the corresponding contingent of diners failed to materialize.
In most cases, including The Salvation Army's usual Thanksgiving dinner on Dauphin Street, operations went as planned, with kitchens working at capacity to serve hundreds of diners.
But The Salvation Army's ambitious first-time attempt to offer a similar holiday meal in Bayou La Batre, volunteers vastly outnumbered the handful of takers who showed up to eat, a result that left organizers scratching their heads.
The day began early in the kitchens. At Mobile's Waterfront Rescue Mission, plans had called for couriers to begin picking up meals at 6 a.m. for delivery all over Mobile County.
By 7:30, things were in full swing: "Plate walkers" carried styrofoam to-go boxes down a serving line, then handed them off to be stacked in cardboard boxes, which in many cases had been festively decorated by students at some area elementary schools.
The boxes then went into cars driven by 35 volunteers and more than a dozen officers from the Mobile Police Department.
Police Sgt. E.L. Woodard, who was taking a dozen meals to a residence in the Roger Williams housing project, said police had been involved in the meal-delivery effort for years.
"The program actually started with us seeing a lot of people in public housing who were less fortunate," he said.
Reta Barnes, a part-time Mission worker, said the organization was on track to deliver more than 1,800 meals Thursday. It would serve several hundred more on-site, she said, putting its total well over 2,000.
Across the Bay in Fairhope, meanwhile, a much smaller but no less intense effort was under way at the Church Street Café, a business owned by chef Patrick Dominick and his mother, Ann Dominick.
About a dozen volunteers worked busily to prepare enough food for just over 100 meals. Drivers arrived at 10:30 a.m. to begin transporting to residences scattered across central Baldwin County.
Ann Dominick said that she and her son launched their effort four weeks ago and would have been able to prepare more food with more time. As it was, they'd cooked 10 turkeys and were using "every pot, everything we've got" to serve 100.
Volunteers did everything from prepping vegetables Monday and Tuesday nights to washing dishes Thursday - the small café kitchen has no automatic dishwasher.
Later in the morning, The Salvation Army met with some mixed results in its Mobile efforts. At its Dauphin Street facility, it was business as usual for a Thanksgiving, serving 800 to 1,000 people.
But at the Bayou La Batre Community Center, dozens of volunteers stood ready for action as the seats at four long tables stayed stubbornly empty. Organizers had expected to serve anywhere from 500 to 1,500 people, but after the first hour, only a dozen or so had showed up to take advantage of the feast.
Organizers opted to view it as a learning experience.
Maj. Ted Morris, area commander of The Salvation Army, said his organization and its partner agencies would re-evaluate what they need to do to get the word out in a diverse community like Bayou La Batre.
He has no doubt the need is there, he said, given that the community has been hit hard by the general economic downturn and this summer's oil spill. The Salvation Army still plans to offer a Christmas meal there, though it might be on a smaller scale.
"We're not discouraged," he said. "Surprised, disappointed, but not discouraged."
He was clear on another point, as well: "The food's not going to go to waste," he said. "We serve 450 meals a day in Mobile."
Those words doubtless will be well received by students at Virginia College in Mobile, who did the cooking.
Stacy Killingsworth, director of public relations and volunteer services for The Salvation Army of Coastal Alabama, said her organization didn't have the kitchen space or staff to take on the Bayou La Batre effort on its own.
The solution, Killingsworth said, was a partnership with the Mobile campus of Virginia College, located in the Festival Center off Airport Boulevard. This fall the school opened a new branch of its Culinard Institute, a culinary training program.
The Salvation Army provided the food; the school provided staff, students and two gleaming new industrial kitchens.
And so, at the college on Tuesday afternoon, chef Jason Lafferty, the head of operations for the program, looked on as Carla Strachan, Magan Stalmach and other students worked to finish up.
A 45-gallon kettle of homemade turkey stock bubbled in the background as the students carved up some of the 60 turkeys they'd cooked. Lafferty noted with pride that all the practice had made students noticeably quicker and more confident about dismantling the carcasses.
In a walk-in cooler, he showed off racks holding food: 26 aluminum pans of caramelized sweet potatoes, each enough to serve 40 to 50 people. Similar amounts of green beans and greens (some donated by the school itself) also stood ready for loading.
Lafferty said the effort had involved 36 students and three instructors, and that all their time had been "above and beyond" their normal coursework.
"The opportunity far outweighed any other type of thought," he said.
One theme throughout the agencies contacted by the Press-Register was that needs were running high, but so was the spirit of volunteerism.
Bill Bru, executive director of the Waterfront Rescue Mission, said the Mission started signing up helpers on Nov. 1, and by Nov. 10 had all it could use.
Killingsworth said The Salvation Army had ample volunteers for its Thanksgiving effort well ahead of time, and, in fact, had already signed up all the volunteers needed for its Christmas meal.
In the little café kitchen in Fairhope, Ann Dominick said she felt it was "unfortunate" that she had to turn volunteers away "because we'd like to use everybody."
"It's been overwhelming, the outpouring of support," she said. ?
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