Thanksgiving Comes To NK Food Pantry

The turkeys arrived 10 a.m. Tuesday at the North Kingstown Food Pantry, just a couple hours before clients were to beginning arriving to collect a turkey and all the fixings for a Thanksgiving feast. 

The pantry was preparing for 240 clients to come through the door Tuesday, said Bonnie Smith, the pantry director. The whole pantry was prepped for the distribution, thanks to several hours' worth of work Monday night, Smith said. Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts were on hand, along with pantry volunteers, making room for the carrots, the onions, the bread, the canned goods, all the items that make Thanksgiving Thanksgiving.

The turkeys came from the Make a Difference Foundation, an East Greenwich-based foundation with one focus in mind: to deliver turkeys to those in need for Thanksgiving. 

Bob and Ann McCann started the foundation more than 20 years ago, after realizing how good it felt to donate a turkey to an organization in Providence. They enlisted friends and it just started to grow. 

On the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, 3,000 Make a Difference turkeys are distributed throughout Rhode Island by the members of the board and their families. Board member Allen Gammons was at the NK Food Pantry stop. His truck was loaded with potatoes donated by Ocean State Job Lot that he was going to distribute at other stops.

"It’s really nice for the kids to see where everything’s going to go," said Ann of the Tuesday deliveries. The four McCann children have been doing it their whole lives. "It’s a really nice tradition. It helps a lot of people. We see it first hand, which is really nice."