The Suffield community stepped up this week to help victims of Hurricane Sandy. Suffield Schools sponsored wear red days and collected cash to donate to the Red Cross. Carloads full of donations hit the road to the southern part of the state.
Members of the West Suffield Congregational Church went down to Milford ealier this week with 200 sandwiches and a few cases of water not knowing what to expect, according to Liz McGann.
"The senior center that they stopped at had run out of food to feed the elderly in their area except for a few hot dogs," she explained. "They said that the people were like angels dropping out of the sky. If that doesn't bring a tear to your eye. They drove a little farther south and found a church serving as a shelter that had completely run out of food."
Because the need was so great, church members went down again the next day.
"Many people are not only still without electricity but without food. More then we realized," she said.
Maura Klesczewski and her family were part of another large effort in town to get supplies and help to those in need.
"The donations were so generous," she explained. "We had at least 80 - 24 packs/36 packs of water bottles, another dozen gallons of water bottles, close to 100 tubes of toothpaste and at least 100 toothbrushes as well. Also a box of small bottles of Listerine. There was large box with at least 200 mini First Aide kits! Four large boxes of diapers plus wipes. Four Costco sized toilet paper, and 2 Costco sized paper towels. One SUV was filled with food items like Cup of Soup, crackers, granola bars, peanut butter, jelly, juice boxes, Yoohoo milk, mini snack packages for kids. Some people even donated Halloween Candy! For the kids! One lady delivered two bags of blankets she ran to buy the night before hoping to keep some people warm! Another lady, who had her two sons in the car, said she had gone to Costco to just shop to donate! She said her husband is deployed, and she is so happy to help out."
"The Red Cross ladies looked at us with tears in their eyes," Klesczewski said. "They said they had never gotten donations of this size before. That brought tears to my eyes, and I was just so thankful for the teachers I work with at Center School and the residents of Suffield. The whole experience has been extremely rewarding to my family. It is truly amazing what people can do, for people in need... when they work together as a team!"
