WIU part of national record breaking attempt
By Jarod Wells
Thursday, November 12, 2009 at 5:51 p.m.
Read more: Local, State, National, Community, Education
(Macomb, Ill.) Western Illinois University has some high hopes for this year's Stuff The Bus canned food drive.
The drive started at 8 o'clock Thursday, November 12th and ran through 10 o'clock at night.
It was the 4th annual Helping Hands Across America Stuff the Bus event.
Schools across the nation teamed up to try and break the current world record of more than 396,000 pounds of food collected.
WIU's food provider, Sodexo will donate the food to area food pantries and the Black Student Union for its annual Thanksgiving basket project.
Last year WIU collected 15,176 pounds of food, it's shooting for 25,000 this year.
If you hit that 25,000 pound mark will you be doing your part to get that world record?
"We would be doing more than our part. We came in second nationwide last year. This year we're hoping to be the largest school contributor across the country," said Allen Nemec, Sodexo District Manager.
Volunteers at Bayliss-Henneger Hall had some fun with the items they collected.
They built a bus with working headlights and a toilet.
The toilet was symbolizing flushing hunger.
Tune in to KHQA's News at 5, 6 and 10 Friday, November 13th to find out how much food WIU was able to collect.
We told you some of the food from the Stuff the Bus Event would go to the WIU Black Student Union's Thanksgiving baskets.
Here's what some other communities do around the holidays.
On Thanksgiving, the Quincy Salvation Army has a free dinner along with meals delivered that day as well.
They serve about 1,000 meals on Thanksgiving Day
The American Legion in Hannibal provides a Thanksgiving meal for people who are in need.
The Hannibal Salvation Army says their shelves aren't full, but look better then they did six weeks ago. It has a Christmas food giveaway
God's Way Christian Center in Keokuk does provide a Thanksgiving Day Meal.
Keokuk Salvation Army does Christmas Food Baskets and Angel Tree Toys.
A Spokeswoman says they're up about 35-percent on need for all types of assistance.
