The Friends of Coal Ladies Auxiliary “Giving Hearts” program continues to be a major success. In its third year, the program reaches out to the community to offer assistance to those in need.
"We raised enough funding this year to provide Christmas for 63 families -- more than 300 individuals," said Regina Fairchild of the Auxiliary. "The majority of these needy families were deployed military. We reached out across West Virginia as far as Wheeling and Camp Dawson, literally doubling our number of families from 2010. We are all so very blessed and it truly was an overwhelming experience. Each child receives three gifts they choose, clothing, each parent receives a gift. Enough food is provided for each family for at least two weeks. Imagine all the turkeys and hams, cases of water, juice, potatoes alone."
This year, the FOC Ladies' Auxiliary Giving Hearts event was Saturday, December 10.
The "Giving Hearts" program consists of numerous projects, one of them being our deployed troops in Afghanistan and Iraq.
In 2009, the Friends of Coal Ladies Auxiliary contacted the Golden Knights concerning our deployed military. At that time, they were supplied with a “wish list” from outposts in Afghanistan and Iraq. In that year, they provided such items as a flat-screen television, DVDs, magazines, canned fruit, mixed nuts, candy, foot powder, anti-bacterial wipes, vapor rub and eye drops. These items were sent to 500 deployed troops.
In 2010, the Auxiliary collected food at the Auto Fair and sent that to a West Virginia Guard Unit to Iraq. Along with the food items, they supplied over 100 troops with magazines, DVDs, candy individual antibacterial wipes, as well as air fresheners and many other personal items. http://www.register-