Look Back: Communities take care of all at Christmastime
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Editor's note: The following is a reproduction of historic newspaper items and contains descriptions of people, organizations and events that are understood to be wrong and would not be used today.
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Note: Following are excerpts from the Dec. 26, 1913, edition of the Parkersburg Dispatch News. Before there was a Toys for Tots program, ladies of Parkersburg had created a Toy Mission as a means of distributing Christmas gifts to needy or underprivileged children.
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Santa Finds All of City's Little Folks
[At the gala toy distribution event], following remarks by Captain W.A. Fordyce, officer in charge of the Salvation Army, it was announced that owing to the fact that there had been no snow, Santa Claus suffered the misfortune of having his sleigh runner broke, and left all of his toys here while he went back home to have the sleigh mended. There had been some doubt he said whether or not Santa would get back in time, but a wireless had set at rest that he would be on hand.
Santa Comes Bounding
Before Mr. Miles could proceed with his remarks the sleigh bells were heard jingling followed by Santa Claus bursting through a door near the large tree, in his characteristic attire and was greeted with great enthusiasm by the little ones. With his usual graceful bow in recognition of the reception he turned his attention to aiding the ladies of the Toy Mission committee in distributing the great stack of gifts to the children.
No Detail Omitted
Not the most minute detail of the work was omitted by the members of the committee. The children too small to come, those sick or crippled, were supplied with their share of the Toy Mission toys on Christmas eve. On Wednesday afternoon Mr. J. Doyan Gilbert placed his machine [car] at the disposal of the committee and drove Miss Ida Peters and Miss Hattie Alleman to the City Hospital where there was a little sick boy, to St. Joseph's Hospital where there was a boy too small to go to the distribution, in the neighborhood of the Acme Tool Works where there were a lot of small children, and to a little crippled boy on George street. Mr. Joseph Russell took Mrs. Sprigg D. Camden and Mrs. Monroe Rathbone on a similar mission to the southside to a number of small children whose mother had broken her arm and would be unable to bring them. Mrs. James Madison Jackson in her own car was a real agent of Santa Claus to a lot of little children who live up the river on a houseboat and who lost their mother last year and would have no one to accompany them to the entertainment on Christmas day.
Mrs. Will Dudley did not allow Santa Claus to overlook a little invalid girl and her sister both of whom received beautiful dolls, and bags of candy, nuts and oranges.
The little colored children of the city were looked after in a manner similar to the general distribution. A sum of money was placed in the hands of the Phoenix Library Society, composed of members from all the colored churches and organizations in the city, and one member from each church was appointed to serve on a committee to seek the needy ones and see that they had a merry Christmas. They not only made a happy time for their children, but brought happiness into the lives of many of their old people who cannot work, and have no one to remember them.
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Bob Enoch is president of the Wood County Historical and Preservation Society. If you have comments or questions about Look Back items, please contact him at: roberteenoch@gmail.com, or by mail at WCHPS, PO Box 565, Parkersburg, WV 26102.