Friday, December 18, 2015

Santa Spreads Cheer with a Little Help from Red Cross Elves

‘Tis the season for giving! 


Our region’s smallest chapter of the American Red Cross, the Northern South Carolina chapter, truly embraced the Christmas spirit this year by deciding to adopt four families for the holidays as a chapter – one for each county they serve.
Headquartered in Rock Hill, SC, the Northern SC chapter covers York, Lancaster, Chester, and Chesterfield Counties.

Volunteers, staff, and board members came together for their first annual Adopt-a-Family program. Working with Pilgrim’s Inn, a local homeless shelter and daycare center, Red Crossers bought gifts for needy families with members ranging from 4-28 years old. Pilgrim’s Inn will anonymously deliver the gifts to the families on Christmas morning. Our dedicated volunteers ran this venture from start to finish – from raising the money, to shopping for the gifts, to then delivering them to Pilgrim’s Inn. 

The Red Cross also wanted to bring good tidings and some tasty treats to the children being helped by Pilgrim’s Inn. One of the chapter’s seasoned disaster volunteers, Ray Gannon, regularly helps Santa be in more than one place at the same time, entertaining children during the holiday season wearing a signature red suit. 
With his trusty elves, Santa “flew”  one of the Red Cross Emergency Response Vehicles (ERV) to the facility during the children’s lunch hour to spread cheer. Sauntering with a jolly pep in his step down the colorful hallway, ol’ Saint Nick shook his jingle bells, letting out a commanding “Ho! Ho! Ho!” 

Escorted by Pilgrim’s Inn staff, Santa made his way through each classroom one by one, bringing with him pure merriment. The children jumped with joy as Claus distributed the sugary confections from his red bag. The children had plenty of hugs for their jolly visitor.

The chapter also donated 20 cases of bottled water to augment the Pilgrim's Inn food pantry.

Happy Holidays from your local Red Cross.

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