Photojournalist: Melinda Zosh
Lovingston, VA - Thanksgiving just wouldn't be the same..without that oven-roasted turkey.
About 300 families get some festive food thanks to the Nelson County Pantry. But this year, they almost didn't get their meals.
All the pantry's turkeys, about 4,000 pounds worth, went bad.
Volunteers are usually always prepared for distribution day at the pantry, because it's always the last Saturday of every month.
"You get a number of bags of food, and we load them down will sorts of canned foods, produce, meats and today, turkeys," volunteer Herb Thomas said.
But they say a sort of..catastrophe happened yesterday.
"Our freezer broke down so all of our turkeys thawed out," Thomas said.
"Then it became clear, Oh my God, the freezer's full of rotting turkeys," volunteer Melissa Wender.
"Wow, what a mess that was, 300 turkeys to the landfill." Kim Dickerson, a member of the pantry's Board of Directors, said.
The rotten turkeys cost the pantry about $2,000, forcing them to dig into their Christmas food funds.But with less than 24 hours to spare, they wasted no time.
"But the good news is, we have some turkeys to give out, they're going out," Dickerson said.
They got replacement turkeys from the food bank in Charlottesville, but one problem still remained.
"We need to find a way to keep the turkeys frozen until tomorrow," Wender said.
Temperatures were so cold last night that more than 300 new turkeys were able to stay here overnight. Then volunteers moved them inside to smaller freezers.
"This food is really a blessing to me and family, because I'm a single mother," Angel Howard said. "And I don't really have the means to provide for my family the way I want to."
"Nobody should go without food," James Gregory said. "Because food's the most important gift to have."
Volunteers at the Nelson County Pantry say the community really stepped in to help with donations yesterday.
Even though they managed to get more than 300 new Thanksgiving turkeys, they still need your help so needy families can also have Christmas dinners.
You can also send donations to the Nelson County Pantry, PO Box 353, Lovingston, VA, 22949.
