Faribault Thanksgiving Dinner Another Success

The Faribault Community free Thanksgiving Day Dinner went off without a hitch again this year.  Co-Organizer Laura McColley told KDHL, "We are so thankful for the many volunteers who show up and help in so many ways."

McColley says approximately 900 people enjoyed a meal.  450 were served dine-in style at the Eagles Club and 450 meals were delivered.

Not quite back to pre-pandemic levels but still very good compared to other communities that have similar events.

For example Rochester Salavation Army Major Cornell Voeller says a little over 100 people had a Thanksgiving meal.

Fergus Falls Salvation Army reported delivering 123 meals with between 70 and 100 people dining in and between 20 and 25 volunteers helping serve the meals.

Faribault has no sign up sheets.  People just show up and the numbers have always been much higher than those other locations.

I would guess there were more than 50 of us assisting with meal preparation Wednesday night.

People from outside Faribault stopped to help also.  Jim Sviggum from Kenyon peeled potatoes.  There were about a dozen people at my location and there were other peeling stations.

In addition people diced the potatoes and mashed the potatoes.  Filled cranberry cups and de-boned turkeys.

Thanksgiving morning when I stopped by the Eagles it looked like a high school coaches line with former legendary Waterville-Elysian-Morristown Buccaneers football coach Jon Bakken, former Faribault Falcons baseball and football coach Charlie Madson and former Falcons coach Denny Glynn all assisting packing turkey sandwiches in brown bags with a apple included.

Bakken has most recently been the Offensive Coordinator for the Lakeville South High School varsity football team.

I missed some people who I've peeled potatoes with over the years because they passed away in the last year.  Steve Twiehoff and Jim Tetzloff just to name a couple

Jim died of Leukemia at age 78 last March and Steve also died from cancer in June at age 69.

While on the radio Tuesday Laura and Travis McColley speculated about 50 volunteers assist each year.

When you add meal delivery people it could be closer to 100.

The line was pretty long when I returned from my first batch of deliveries.

I would highly recommend getting involved in some way because it's only a little period of time and appreciated by so many people.

Several of the people I had the pleasure of meeting while delivering were daily KDHL listeners who I would probably have never met.

Many of the people I delivered meals to donated some money which will be used to purchase food through the food shelf.

It is appropriately named the Community Thanksgiving Dinner because it truly is community members serving community members.

I took a meal home and it was delicious.  I didn't over indulge.  Didn't have to do dishes.