Operation Holiday delivers
Newspaper readers help provide Christmas cheer for area families
POTTSTOWN » Operation Holiday is first and foremost about families. But its also about family. It’s about gifts. But it’s also about giving. Twenty-five years ago, The Mercury started Operation Holiday and although the purpose has always involved giving children a happy Christmas, it has evolved to have other traditions and other holiday surprises.
Many families of Mercury employees have grown up showing up for Operation Holiday’s “packing day.”
It’s when all the food that will be provided to 144 families this year is put into a box for delivery to the agencies which identify the region’s neediest families.
Bryan Boyer, now 33, has been lending a hand since he was an elementary school student.
Now an ex-Marine, the son of Mercury driver Bill Boyer has introduced the tradition to his wife Jacquelyn.
“It’s my first year,” she said as the first set of food boxes was set up. “We’ve been together six years, but I’m an E.R. nurse at Ein-
stein in East Norriton and I usually work the night shift so this is the first year I’ve been able to get the day off.”
“I was doing it when we would have the list of addresses and deliver the gifts and food right to the families,” said Boyer, who has only missed packing day for the four years he was stationed at Camp Lejune, N.C.
“At first it was a reason to skip school,” he said with a laugh. “Now it’s a tradition we do every year.”
Kelli Martin is another nurse with a family connection to Operation Holiday.
Daughter of retired Mercury photo chief John Strickler, Martin took a few years off to get a young family started.
“But I think next year my daughter Lydia will be old enough to come with me,” she said — making for what may well be Operation Holiday’s first third-generation of helpers.
All generations are welcome to help and Cait Yergey and her mom Sharon have been helping out ever since Greg Yergey, Cait’s dad and Sharon’s husband, became circulation director at The Mercury.
An alum of Pope John Paul II High School, Cait brought current PJP student Jacob Rogers along for a taste of how The Mercury helps.
But Rogers was certainly not the only high school student lending a hand.
As is also tradition, history teacher Maureen Stocker brought the students from Pottstown High School’s student government ready to work.
Sophomores Kayleigh Gibson, Virginia McCoy Swinehart and Ariane Garcia worked together packing the boxes that moved past them down the conveyor.
“I signed up for it,” said Gibson.”
“My friends told me about it and I just wanted a chance to help people,” Garcia said.
Josh Gery, who’s father served a term on borough council, joked that he is following in his father’s footsteps helping the public.
You’ve probably seen Michael Baker out helping in the community before, but you might not recognize him.
Most of the time, he is one of several wearing the venerable Trojan Man high school mascot costume.
Having won second place in the regional DECA business competition the night before did not keep him from getting up early to help Operation Holiday.
As Baker and Gery took turns packing down the cardboard from the store boxes for recycling, seniors Alex Hickey and Karrisa White made sure the assembly line did not slow down.
John Armato, director of community relations for Pottstown Schools, also shows up every year to help out and to take photos and to remind any reporters who might be listening how often he finds that the students who do the most in the community are so often those who are the busiest — involved in co-curricular activities and other activities beyond the classroom.
And while there are plenty of traditions and family traditions that comprise Operation Holiday’s operations, there’s always space for new blood.
Pottstown resident Kathy Winterbottom convinced her friend Donna Heimbach to volunteer for the day.
“I read about it in the paper and I contacted The Mercury and they told me when I could come down,” Winterbottom said.
“This is just amazing,” said Heimbach. “I had no idea Operation Holiday did so much.”
Sharon Wampole from Gilbertsville was another volunteer happy to help “just because.”
Chemist Ken Cavanaugh has been doing it “just because” for three years now.
“I read about the families who need help during the holiday season and I decided to try helping out,” said Cavanaugh. “I look forward to it every year now, I really enjoy doing it.”
Evidently, so too does Nancy March, who retired in July as The Mercury’s editor, but just can’t seem to stay away from Operation Holiday.
“As I wrote in my column at Thanksgiving, I was here at the beginning. My kids have grown up doing Operation Holiday, it’s part of what I do at Christmas time,” March said.
“And this year was great. We had lots of help and there was a really good feeling, a good atmosphere,” she said.