Cook Judy Vonhedmann removes hot Meals on Wheels dinners from a stove in the basement of English Lutheran Church in Zelienople. The program marks its 50th year in June.

ZELEINOPLE The COVID-19 pandemic may have scuttled the Zelienople Meals on Wheels 50th anniversary observance, but it didn't stop its meals from being delivered even once.

The program — serving meals to people in need in Zelienople, Harmony, Evans City and Callery as well as Fombell in Beaver County — started on June 1, 1970, said Barb Kaufman, Meals on Wheels program director, who's been with the group from the beginning.

That first day, Meals on Wheels took food to five clients who paid $7.50 a week.

A recent Tuesday saw Meals on Wheels volunteer packers and drivers at English Lutheran Church, 200 E. Grandview Ave., preparing meals for delivery to 50 clients along four routes. Today, clients pay $20 a week, or $4 a day for delivery of a hot meal and a cold meal five days a week.

This is an excerpt from a story appearing in Sunday's Butler Eagle.