Powell man spearheads effort to distribute precooked holiday meals
Of all the holiday notes that have turned up in his mail pile, Larry Coolidge remembers the words of only one.
“Thank you for the turkey dinner,” the young boy wrote. “We were going to have pizza.”
For the past 13 years, Coolidge, now 69, has ensured that hundreds of central Ohio families sit down to traditional meals on Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Already an altruist before that — the Powell resident is a member of the Powell Sertoma Club and served on the board of the American Cancer Society and the Delaware Area Recovery Resources program — he initially passed out dinners with an area real-estate group.
“We went to one house, and we gave a family a frozen turkey,” he
recalled. “We got it to them early enough so they could thaw it, but they didn’t have a stove.”
Aghast, he returned to the grocery store to buy a prepared Thanksgiving meal — no oven required — and presented it to the family.
Sensing a need for fully prepared food, Coolidge started raising money for his inaugural Holiday Dinners Project in 2005, printing a flier and sending a donationrequest email to everyone in his address book.
He then bought the precooked dinners at the Kroger in Powell — he now buys them at the Kroger Marketplace on Sawmill Road — and drove them to families he found through area nonprofit organizations.
He has since passed delivery duties on to seven churches, schools and charitable organizations.
“You go up and you take a family a dinner, and they don’t know you,” he said. “They’re a little embarrassed they’re getting a free meal. It was uncomfortable for them and for me. I wasn’t there to impose on their privacy.”
Through the years, Coolidge said, donations from the Delaware Foundation and the Sertoma Club have supplemented those from his friends and relatives. Each Thanksgiving and Christmas, he aims to provide 65 meals — complete with turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, dressing, rolls, pumpkin pie, cranberry salad and green-bean casserole.
One beneficiary is the Andrews House in Delaware, a community-outreach center that distributes food throughout the year, making the partnership a logical one.
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— “Bad Call,” Stephen Wallenfels; nonfiction — “A Short Biography of Jacqueline Kennedy,” Mim Harrison
To donate to the Holiday Dinners Project, visit www.powellsertoma.org. Checks can be mailed to the Powell Sertoma Club, 78 W. Olentangy St., Powell, OH 43065.
Executive Director Mel Corroto said the $50 cost of one of the meals — which feeds six would be prohibitive for most of the families served by the nonprofit. The Andrews House receives 10 to 12 meals from Coolidge at Thanksgiving and again at Christmas.
“In our society, especially in Delaware County, folks have a lot of expenses with their rent and child care and transportation; the one expense that can sort of be shuffled around a little bit is, unfortunately, food,” Corroto said. “That’s how people tend to go hungry in our county, at least. Having this gift is an essential thing that people need, and it’s a beautiful gift to have.”
Coolidge has raised $71,000 in donations, enough to pay for 1,421 meals (for about 8,500 people).
He is matter-of-fact about his efforts, noting that he simply enjoys helping others.
Volunteer Walt Boham, who has known Coolidge since before the outreach started, praises his friend’s work.
“Larry’s a heck of a guy,” said Boham, 73. “He really is.”
The retired mounted deputy for Delaware County uses his contacts at Delaware public schools to identify families who could use a meal. He picks up 10 to 15 at Kroger a day or two before Thanksgiving and Christmas and drops them off to teachers, who get them to their students.
He has participated since the first year and plans to continue for as long as possible.
“I’ve been blessed through life, so you just try to pass it on,” said Boham, of Sunbury. “I’ve always had dinners and never had to worry about it.”
Coolidge said he couldn’t handle the growing number of donations and families in need without Boham or the halfdozen volunteers who make deliveries.
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