PORT ANGELES — Hundreds flocked Thursday to the Queen of Angels Community Thanksgiving Dinner, grateful in the face of hardship.
Stephen McBride, 38, on the federal Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program, was in the Catholic church gym with his nephew, Tyler Dalgardno, 5.
McBride was among the 1,500 to 2,000 attendees at the Catholic church gym who dug into donated fare, including 50 turkeys, 24 hams and 400 pounds of potatoes peeled and mashed that morning.
Stricken since age 12 with Crohn’s disease, McBride loved baseball and was a switch-hitter even when the inflammatory bowel ailment cut short his dreams and his education at Port Angeles High School.
Trays of ham and turkey await participants in Thursday’s community dinner at Queen of Angels Catholic Church in Port Angeles. (Keith Thorpe/Peninsula Daily News)
After surgical procedures and newer medication, “I’ve been doing a lot better,” said McBride, a Port Angeles native who lives with his father and stepmother.
He was most thankful this Thanksgiving Day for his family.
Without them, “it would be rough,” he said.
A line of 100 people stretched out the gym door by 12:30 p.m., making a happy couple of Tim and Gwuinifer Carradine of Port Angeles, coordinating the dinner for the first time after taking over for Reath Ellefson, who continues to battle cancer.
The Carradines, owners of the computer-support company Computech Systems, are former longtime Forks residents who moved to Sequim before relocating 15 months ago to Port Angeles.
Deacon Richard Labrecque of St. Joseph Parish, right, leads meal servers in a prayer before opening the doors to the public on Thansgiving Day. (Keith Thorpe/Peninsula Daily News)
After themselves volunteering last year for the first time, they were deep in the throes of coordinating their first Queen of Angels Turkey Day feast.
Recognizing their youth and energy, Ellefson asked the couple to take the reins, Gwuinifer said after she rattled off instructions to volunteer bussers and servers with an ever-present smile.
Why take on the responsibility?
“It makes me happy to serve people,” she said.
“I serve the Lord through serving his children.”
Even with the long line of people waiting to be served milk, rolls, turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing, corn, peas, ambrosia salad, bean salad, cranberries and all manner of cakes and pies, Tim was glad dinner-goers were finally able to inch their way through the line.
Individuals and businesses donated about $6,000 worth of food for the event, Tim said.
“I will let you in, I promise,” was going through his mind as the line built up outside, he recalled.
Leon Whitley, 48, of Port Angeles, said he needed another plate by the time he reached the second half of the food train.
“OK, we’ll be looking for you,” a server chimed back.
Whitley, in a party of people including Vicky Ruf, 37, were the first through the doors at 11:30 a.m.
Whitley, who grew up in Port Townsend, worked at Washington Marine Repair in Port Angeles and as a flagger.
He works part time at a second-hand furniture store and lives in a 38-foot travel trailer.
“I’m thankful they can do this for people,” he said.
Michael McNulty of Port Angeles stirs pots of gravy at the start of Thursday’s community meal in Port Angeles. (Keith Thorpe/Peninsula Daily News)
Ruff, 37, a former William Shore Memorial Pool lifeguard and swimming teacher, has been unemployed for a couple of years, she said.
She lined up at 8:30 a.m. Thursday.
The feast, she said, “just makes us feel like part of the community.”
Among those serving Whitley, Ruf, McBride and his nephew were two Queen of Angels students, fifth-grader Zoey Howe, 10, and fourth-grader Ella Desser, 9.
Desser ladled out bean salad while her friend tended the ambrosia salad.
“I’m here because I like to help people have Thanksgiving, for people who don’t have, like a family to spend time to have Thanksgiving with, who probably don’t have enough food or something, so that’s why I’m here,” Desser said.
“I’m doing it because I just feel bad for them and so I kind of want to make them have a really good Thanksgiving.”
A table with about 200 plates of cake and pie at the ready was squeezed into a room next to the kitchen, a bustling place not large enough for the steaming pots outside.
There, a few feet from the back door steps, corn, peas and potatoes were boiling in pots under Jack Hopkins’ watchful eye.
“It’s like feeding an army,” said the 61-year-old Hopkins, a veteran and former longtime Forks resident.
Hopkins, whose parents died when he was a child, was raised by his uncle at a house next door to the church.
The 1976 Port Angeles High School graduate and retired log-truck driver was part of Thursday morning’s crew of potato-peelers in his first stint as a Community Thanksgiving Dinner volunteer.
“It gets me outside myself and gives me something productive to do,” Hopkins said.
He received medical assistance for a hip replacement and had alcohol and drug issues he worked through with the help of others.
“On my way up, I found that people that are in service have a tendency to be more happy in life, you know, and serving others, it gets you outside yourself,” he said.
“It makes me feel better in my own skin, and I can lay my head down at night and feel good about the person I am.
“I’m pretty happy today.”
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 55650, or at pgottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
