Atlanta Daily World

ADVOCATES MAKING CHRISTMAS 364 DAYS A YEAR FOR POOR

By SAM McKIBBEN

WAKE UP. ATLANTANS. WAKE UP! Christmas has gone, leaving in its wake many joys and much happiness. Among other things, the passing of Christmas left mankind in the melting pot, literally cast into the swirling vortex of tumult and unpaid bills. Who cares about bills? As long as we have good jobs and the health necessary to hold them, bills are more or less ghostly apparitions to contend with at regular intervals - but this article is not to deal with that phase of Christmas. As an exponent of joy to the families, taken care of by the Atlanta Daily WORLD Christmas Cheer Fund, may I modestly ask that the recent Christmas was the best I ever had. I did not spend much money and I didn't receive a fortune in gifts but I did receive more happiness and joy than a million dollars could buy. Before I reveal the source of my joy, I will reproduce a poem sent in by one of the families I visited:

Oh, what is life without friend
To dissipate our gloom?
A path where naught but briers grow,
Where flowers never bloom.
Tis friends who make this desert world
To bloom as the rose,
Strew flowers o'er rugged path,
Pour sunshine oer our woes.

In delivering food to unfortunates on Christmas Eve and on into Christmas morning, your scribe witnessed suffering humanity groveling in the very depths of miserable poverty! Imagine five persons sleeping in one room... he saw eight, ten, and an occasional dozen sleeping in one room at many places on our list of stops. Picture a family of one half that size receiving a basket ordinarily made up for no more than three persons. If you had been there to see the faces of members of a family remembered by the more fortunate how they would light up in genuine expressions of gratitude, or to hear their devout thanks to God for answering their midnight prayers, you too would have been touched, you too would have had a Merrier Christmas and your joys would have been doubled ten fold.

Now, dear readers. I don't wish to crow about serving on the committee which was instrumental in bringing joy to others. instead I want to bring certain facts before you, facts that I had overlooked, that you had overlooked. Read another little verse sent in by a family whose home was visited:

O Friendship, thou balm and sweetener of LIFE!
Kind parents of ease and composer of STRIFE!
Without thee, alas! What are riches and power,
But empty delusions, the joy of an hour?

The above mentioned facts are these: Come Christmas and we are elaborate, we are generous. We contribute to various funds a particular fund so that less fortunate brother may enjoy the yuletide or eat a good square meal or send him coal so that he may be warm on Christmas day But what of the other 364 days of the year? True, we do our part every Christmas, but is it true that we FORGET those helped after Christmas? Do we supply enough coal to keep a family warm during January, February and March? Do we supply enough food to last until next Christmas? No, and we know that when we make our contribution, We do not endeavor to do more than make Christmas happy yet unconsciously we make the days to come more acute in pain and hardship If we are able to help our fallen fellowman December 25, with our united effort, why do we stop? We are able to combine our efforts once a year with remarkable results.... then why SHOULDN'T we combine them for the entire year? Each group of five contributors could care for a small family throughout the year We can do it But Why Don't WE?

The poems in this article were sent to me, but it was not to me that the thanks stopped I was only a delivery agent, delivering the joy that you, you, you, and many, many other generous Atlantans made possible. You made their Christmas a happy one and they are grateful.