Battle Creek VAMC Wraps Up Toys For Tots Season
The Battle Creek VA Medical Center (VAMC) has completed their 2023 Marine Corps Reserve Toys for Tots campaign, collecting donations from VA staff and Veterans on December 8, 2023, helping to support local youth this holiday season.
The annual campaign aims to bring the joy of Christmas and send a message of hope to America’s disadvantaged children. As of 2023, the Toys for Tots organization has collected and distributed 652 million toys to 291 million deserving children.
“As we grow older, we often forget what it was like to be child who wakes up before their parents do on Christmas morning to see the gift or gifts that Santa brought,” said Luke Wasick, Battle Creek VAMC Fire Department Chief. “It kills me to know that there are children out there that would not be able to experience that and so the ability to provide children gifts is the best gift of all.”
In 2022, the local Toys for Tots was able to distribute 14,635 toys and provide support to 2,975 children within the Battle Creek and Kalamazoo area. The Battle Creek VAMC began accepting donations November 14th, to include its’ Clinics in the surrounding areas of Michigan. During the last few days of the campaign, the Battle Creek VAMC Fire Department set up a collection point outside the medical center entrance for people to drop off their donations.
“I hope the kids who receive these gifts get that feeling of pure joy that a kid should experience when receiving a gift regardless of where the gift came from,” said Wasick. “I am truly blessed that I became a member of this Fire Department family back in 2012 that shares the same feelings as I do as we worked to collect these gifts with the Toys For Tots program.”
This year, the Battle Creek VAMC was able to collect and fill 10 large bins of valued at nearly $5,000 worth of donated toys, puzzles and games. The donations will now be sent to a collection center where they will be sorted through and then delivered to children locally.
Toys for Tots began 76 years ago when the wife of a Marine made a doll and wanted to give it to a child, and through the Marine Corp Reserve, the program grew and soon spread all over the country.
To find out more about how you can support Toys for Tots this holiday season through toys or monetary donations, visit toysfortots.org, or email Michael Moross, Toys for Tots Coordinator, Branch County, Branch Area Detachment 763 at Bad763mcl@ymail.com.