Christmas Fund: 99 years of memories

The memory hasn’t faded.

Eight-year-old Evelyn Barker’s mom was making supper. Her older brother glanced outside the windows of the farmhouse where the family lived, near where Allen and Northmoor roads now meet, to check on the blizzard raging outside.

He saw a red light reflecting off the snow and stepped outside to see it better. He came running back in. “Dad, the house is on fire!”

It was Dec. 18, 1929 — 82 years ago today.

Now 90, Evelyn Stedman of Chillicothe thinks of that night and the days that followed every Christmas, when she sees Journal Star stories on the newspaper’s Christmas Fund.

There was no helping the Barkers that night. Evelyn, her mom and infant brother were huddled in the car, watching her brother and father desperately trying to save the house.

“My dad went back in twice,” she said. “The first time, he grabbed his black box that had all his insurance papers and such. The second time, he could only go as far as the kitchen. He grabbed a pan of potatoes that was on the stove. That’s all he could get.”

The roads were impassable. Two neighbors walked over to offer assistance, but by the time they arrived, the farmhouse was gone.

The men helped Evelyn’s father get the family to her aunt’s house half a mile away. They had to walk in front of a horse hauling a farm wagon she, her brothers and her mom rode in, shoveling a path as they walked. It took two hours.

“The next morning, a man from the Red Stocking Fund came and asked us what we would need,” Evelyn said.

He came back two days later with clothes, blankets, baby bottles, diapers and a rag doll for Evelyn.

“Mom and Dad were so amazed,” she said.

It was the first time she’d heard of the Red Stocking Fund.

Finding our history

Journal Star staff members are often treated to heartfelt stories from people who were helped by the Journal Star Christmas Fund in their youth. It’s one measure of the import of the program, and the good it has done for so long.

We didn’t realize just how long.

It’s not uncommon for a newspaper, a chronicler of history, to neglect to track its own. It’s also true that it’s difficult to realize a legacy is being created during the fact.

Our own archives, in stories dating at least to the 1960s and ’70s, peg the Red Stocking Fund, one of the early versions of today’s Christmas Fund, as starting in 1921.

But the newspapers of 1921 tell a different story.

“No, there never WAS such a party,” reads a Dec. 25, 1921, Journal-Transcript article. “Not in the ten years that The Journal has had a Red Stocking Club. We’re talking about the wonderful Christmas party which the Journal Red Stocking club held yesterday afternoon in front of ‘Your Newspaper’ offices.”

Ten years? That’s not the introductory story we were expecting. We found that one in the Dec. 25, 1913, Peoria Journal, a year off from the 10 years the Journal-Transcript article indicated.

“A new organization this year is the Journal Red Stocking club. Following the appeals of this paper the people of Peoria responded nobly and filled 300 of these Red Stockings, and they were late yesterday and early today distributed to 300 poor children of Peoria, making that number of childish hearts beat with previously unknown joy.”

Based on that article, and assuming the tradition continued each year, this year marks the 99th this newspaper, in various incarnations that evolved into the Journal Star, has distributed toys through its signature red stockings.

That’s a staggering number.

“I would have to imagine that if we’re approaching the 100th anniversary of this effort, it has to be one of the longest running funds that is expressly for serving the underprivileged and needy during the holiday season,” said Journal Star Publisher Ken Mauser.

The 1921 Journal-Transcript article provides other hints of the evolution of the Red Stocking club. That year, folks still took red stockings the paper supplied, filled them with toys and returned them. But people also sent in contributions that purchased food. That’s similar to today’s Christmas Fund, which buys toys and food with money readers contribute.

“They want you to know that never before has the fund been as high as $600, the total for this year,” the article states. “They want you to know that never before have there been as many as 600 Red Stockings filled and brought in to the fund in addition to the money contributions. They want you to know the money has been turned over to Adjutant Fookes of the Salvation Army and with it he is paying for the many Christmas dinners which the Salvation Army is distributing in Peoria today.”

Actually, another article catalogs $624.07 raised that year. The day’s tally is listed individually, a practice that stands today. Dunlap High School sent $1 that day, as did Mrs. J. M. Bilk and J. A. Hutchinson. Otto Kreis, Harry Morgan Lewis and Elizabeth and William Cooley each sent $5.

It’s also interesting that the Salvation Army was involved from the first year, handing out tickets for stockings to children its staff deemed needy and purchasing food when the newspaper began collecting money from readers for holiday meals. It still serves as the clearinghouse for distributing food and toys, from the Christmas Fund and other charities.

The Red Stocking tradition also is part of the economic history of Peoria. The newspaper’s stories show an even greater appreciation for the gifts it distributes in hard times — the Depression, Caterpillar Inc.’s major downturn of the early 1980s, and during labor strikes.

“The Christmas Fund was hope to a lot of kids and families during the Depression, when that little net stocking was all they got,” said Joy Anderson, a former 25-year employee of the Journal Star marketing department, who retired as its director.

At some point, the Journal Star began printing the notes donors sent with their contributions in the list of each day’s take. “In lieu of Christmas cards.” “In loving memory of Mom.” The practice helped cement the tradition of the fund because giving became an annual tradition for many.

“It’s not only a gift to people who receive help. It’s a way for people to memorialize those they love. And I think that’s very important also,” Anderson said.

The newspaper also changed the way it approached covering its own fund over the decades. In the early years, the stories were full of flowery appeals and applause for the donors.

“If you can afford but a few cents for the cause you will be helping home one of Peoria’s ragged little urchins on Christmas eve,” one story read.

At some point, as times changed, the newspaper switched to using the stories to introduce readers to some of the many people they were helping when they donated.

“Clearly, the power of the press helps get the story of the need out on a very personal and individual basis,” Mauser said.

That’s not to say credit for the effort goes to the paper, he said.

“This is the community’s money,” Mauser said. “We’re merely the conduit during the holiday season.”

Today, our readers raise $185,000 each year to purchase 1,700 backpacks of toys — the red stockings were switched to backpacks a number of years ago — and 5,085 baskets of food.

The Christmas Fund was incorporated as a not-for-profit in 1961. Every cent readers donate goes to purchase toys and food. The administrative work, and the stories that appeal for donations, are a labor of love for Journal Star staff members.

“It’s been the privilege of countless Journal Star employees from all departments of the building to facilitate this fundraising on behalf of the community, together with the numerous partners that assist us, such as the Salvation Army,” Mauser said.

Jennifer Towery can be reached at 686-3119 or jtowery@pjstar.com.