Many join in Toys for Tots gift collection
A diverse group of Toys for Tots contributors are doing their part to make sure Christmas stockings are stuffed this year.
Among the many volunteers helping the U.S. Marine Corps Reserves toy program were a Christian school's student body, a Boyers business, a Moniteau High School senior and Penn United Technologies employees who wanted to honor a late co-worker.
The colleagues of Mark Bishop of Butler decided to continue his work for Toys for Tots after he was killed in a car accident in February.
Don Roth of Cabot, who worked in the tooling department of Penn United in Jefferson Township with Bishop, said, “He would volunteer for 12-hour days, sometimes running around putting out boxes. He did a couple of motorcycle runs.”
Another of Bishop's co-workers, Steve Barker, said, “I believe someone in his family was in the Marines, his uncle, and that's how he got involved in Toys for Tots. And he felt that was a calling. He was unmarried and that's what he filled his time with.”
The 105 members of the tooling department scheduled fundraisers, dinners and 50/50 raffles to raise money.
“We started in April after Mark's crash,” said Roth. “We decided we were going to do it for Toys for Tots.”
“We raised over $4,000. Six of us from Penn United went to Toys R Us the Saturday before Thanksgiving. We took a box truck from Penn United. It's a pretty big truck, and we filled it half up,” he said.
With discounts, Roth said they were able to buy $6,500 worth of toys.
In addition, Roth said, Bishop's family donated his tools to be auctioned off to an apprentice and turned the money over to the toy charity.
“One of our customers donated the batteries for the toys we bought,” said Roth. “We tried to put them with the toys. We will try to be a little better organized next year. We didn't know what we were getting into.” But, he said, they do plan to do it again next year.Over at HIS Kids Christian School, 650 Saxonburg Road in Jefferson Township, the student body contributed $330 that went toward purchasing toys this year.LeAnn Yamnitsky, the preschool teacher at the school, said the money was raised through the efforts of the parents group, HIS Kids Boosters.Yamnitsky said the 58-member student body purchased items for $1 at a store in the school run by the parents group Dec. 9, 10 and 11.“This year we did something different,” she said. “They were allowed to purchase items for their parents and their grandparents. In the past, they were allowed to purchase something for themselves, but this year that money was also put toward Toys for Tots.”“The student council of sixth-graders along with Christian Education Director Carol Novy went to Boscov's because one of the students' mothers worked there and was able to give us an additional 15 percent discount on the toys,” she said.Then, Yamnitsky said, on Dec. 12, active-duty Marines Nicholas Keith and Chad Krumpe and retired Marine Stan Schubert arrived at the school to collect the toys for the Butler County Toys for Tots.“We participated in Toys for Tots for the last three or four years,” said Yamnitsky. “In the past, we had a box, and parents brought items that they put in the box.”A senior at Moniteau High School, Sarah Neff of Hilliards raised $1,000, more than half of it in pennies, for Toys for Tots as her senior project.Neff said, “We have to do a senior project for our school, and I thought it would be a nice thing to do for Christmas for kids.”Neff said she set up containers in the 30 homerooms of Moniteau High and challenged the rooms to a penny war that lasted from Oct. 28 to Nov. 11.Every penny counted toward the room's score, but any other contributed coin decreased the score.“I collected them in jars and took them home in bags every day,” Neff said.After she and her mother rolled all the coins, Sarah said she bought two shopping carts full of toys to take to the West Sunbury American Legion Post, a distribution center for Toys for Tots.“I bought both girls and boys toys up to age 10,” said Sarah.Asked why she picked Toys for Tots to benefit from her project, Sarah said, “I want to get into the medical field around children, and I decided this would be a good thing to work with kids.”And while some children will find a present come Christmas morning, it will take a little longer for Sarah to learn how her project fared.“We'll get a grade on our senior project that I won't know until March because you have to write a paper and present it,” she said.And Beth Butcherine's Toys of Tots collection effort has grown over the years to include all of Boyers and surrounding areas, she said.The owner of Butcherine's beer distributor, 2119 W. Sunbury Road in Boyers, she said she started collecting for the charity because of her husband, Don, who was a retired lieutenant commander in the Navy with 26 years of service.It started out inauspiciously, she said.“I think it's been 12 or 13 years,” Butcherine said. “I'm really not sure. At first I put a box out, but nobody put anything into it.”But thanks to her husband's memberships in the American Legion Post in West Sunbury and the Paul W. Wood VFW Post 7840 in Cherry Valley and her daughter, Natalie Butcherine's Facebook postings, Butcherine said this year's collection of toys and money was successful.She said her niece, Holly Thompson of Eau Claire, also collected toys from her baby-sitting clients.“It's really snowballed,” she said. “We get the community, customers, the veterans groups, older people and relatives.”She said the drive raised $1,200 this year.
