On This Day in History…
By James Holcomb, CFRE

Did you know that Meals-on-Wheels of Johnson and Ellis Counties will celebrate a landmark in 2007? Last year marked the 30th year of serving the children of yesterday by helping needy homebound elderly and disabled persons remain independent and healthy in their homes by providing home-delivered meals, daily personal contact, and support for individuals and their families

What is a landmark? It is a “watershed, a turning point; an event making a unique or historical change of course or one on which important developments depend.” Recently, Queen Elizabeth II visited the U.S. to help commemorate the 400th anniversary of Jamestown, England’s first permanent colony in the New World. That event was truly a landmark in the history of our country.

The launching of Meals-on-Wheels of Johnson and Ellis Counties is no less significant as a landmark in our history. Who knew in 1977 that a small band of volunteers serving a handful of meals in Cleburne, would grow to over five hundred volunteers serving 600 meals daily to a two-county service area? We took a big step in 2001 when we began serving our neighbors in Ellis County, serving over 1,700 square miles in North Texas.

All these remarkable achievements would not be possible without the hundreds of volunteers who help deliver the meals to our homebound neighbors, and the many friends who support this effort through their generous contributions and gifts. To paraphrase the words of Winston Churchill, “Never…was so much owed by so many to so few.”

Someone has said, “The past is prologue”, and so it is as we thank our current volunteers and donors for all their past help, and encourage them to help us identify others to join us in moving forward to what the next 30 years has in store for our organization. We know the need for our services will continue to grow, as we are serving 30% more meals today than this time LAST YEAR! As we think about serving 1,000+ people daily, it will be much more cost effective to prepare meals in-house at a regional facility, which means the need for a capital campaign in the near future. Your help and support will be needed as never before.

No matter how many people we serve, or how wide our service area becomes, our mission will remain the same: helping the needy elderly and homebound live better lives! Happy 30th Anniversary Meals-on-Wheels of Johnson and Ellis Counties!

About the Author:
James Holcomb, CFRE, is a life-long fundraiser who has helped raised millions of dollars for local non-profits in the Fort Worth area, as well as promoting the profession through his work with the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP). Like Meals-on-Wheels, Mr. Holcomb is celebrating a landmark of his own: 50 years of impacting lives through his work with organizations like ours. Congratulations James for your dedication to your community!

Meals-on-Wheels is a community-based, non-profit organization serving the homebound elderly and disabled residents throughout Johnson and Ellis counties. For more information, contact Meals-on-Wheels at (817) 558-2840 or (972) 351-9943, or on the web at www.servingthechildrenofyesterday.org.