INNISFAIL – Johns Manville’s 6th annual Family Christmas Turkey Dinner at the Innisfail Royal Canadian Legion Branch #104 has gone over the 1,000 mark in the number of meals served.
And École John Wilson Elementary School is this year’s recipient of a generous holiday season donation of $3,970; money that will used to purchase books and materials for the campus library to support student learning with the new curriculum.
“This year we partnered with John Wilson elementary hoping to get more families out with kids, but also the proceeds; any cash we take in tonight we will donate to the school. It is going to their library program,” said Cathy Ouellette, group HR leader for installation for Johns Manville, who praised the community response for this year’s turkey dinner.
“It was packed,” said Ouellette of the dinner that was held from 4:30 to 7 p.m. on Dec. 13. “Last year we had 700 people and we hoped to feed over 1,000 people tonight.”
With the partnership established for the holiday season turkey dinner, staff from École John Wilson Elementary School enthusiastically came to the event and set up a crafts table for kids.
“Our school is thankful to work with Johns Manville this year for their annual Family Turkey Christmas Dinner. It is such a great opportunity to connect with our community in the spirit of family, friends, and Christmas,” said Angela Warke, principal at École John Wilson Elementary School. “To help support their efforts to bring more families out to enjoy supper each year, we hosted a craft corner for the kids to come and make a few different Christmas crafts and decorate cookies. Our teachers were excited to be there and have fun with the crafters.
“Johns Manville is a strong community supporter and generously offered to contribute to our wish to continue to expand our library program by making a donation to the school from the proceeds of the dinner,” added Warke.
This year’s event also included a photo booth with Santa Claus and live entertainment from Olds singer and songwriter Dustin Farr.
“It's a fantastic display of community support to see all these people flooding in here,” said Farr, an Olds resident for the past 14 years and teacher in the ag management and technology programs at Olds College.
“Our food banks have been pushed to the max this season; just with everything that's happening in the world,” added Farr. “It's great to be able to see as many people as possible be able to come out here and get a good hot meal.”
The Johns Manville-sponsored Family Christmas Turkey Dinner was also able to collect 354 lbs. of food for the Innisfail & District Food Bank, donations brought by citizens to the event, with many choosing to use it as the price of admission.
Citizens also had the choice to pay $10 for a single ticket or $20 for families.
The event also had support of other organizations, including the legion for donating its auditorium for the event, the Innisfail Public Library for donating books, Day Dental for providing dental gift bags and Complete Catering for its ongoing support.
As for the meal itself Ouellette said it was put on as a labour of love by Johns Manville employees.
“The deal with this dinner is that the employees have donated all the food; turkeys, potatoes, you name it,” said Ouellette, noting about 50 employees were helping during the turkey dinner on Dec. 13, with almost every employee out of a total of about 200 making some sort of donation. “And then today all the employees cooked the meal. They’re serving the meal and will clean up after the meal.
“And then Johns Manville itself helped out with a little bit of the cost for the singer and the photo booth,” she added. “We’re hoping to make it bigger and better every year.”
