Editor,

I am almost 80 years old, and have had two strokes that rendered my right hand almost useless.

After reading the item in the Atchison County Mail, I went to the grocery and purchased turkeys, and drove to Tarkio to deliver them to the Nutrition Center to deliver. When I arrived there was a note on the door “Closed for 2 weeks (name) has COVID.” Nothing stating who to call or where to deliver.

I went over to the Drug Store and no one there knew about it. One lady directed me to Community Services. When I arrived there, I found a note on the door “Closed.” As I was leaving I noticed a lady (Angel of Mercy) leaving the food pantry. I asked her assistance. She was kind enough to call someone, who said I should deliver them to a private residence there in Tarkio, leave them on the front porch, ring the bell and leave.

After my strokes, not only does my right hand not work, my balance is very poor. Needless to say, my attitude was less than pleasant after I made a few laborious trips to get those turkeys on that porch.

Wouldn’t it have been much more effective to have had a phone number – address on the Nutrition Site door? Would I pursue this activity again???

Bertie Stephens

As a representative of the newspaper in which this story ran, a representative of the Tarkio Chamber of Commerce for which my employer is a member, and as a citizen of the town to which the Tarkio Nutrition Center serves, I felt it extremely important that a public explanation be provided along with your public letter.

It is true that the newspaper has been running a story for a few weeks time now about dropping turkeys off at the Tarkio Nutrition Center to be donated to those people in need this Thanksgiving. It is also true that the Nutrition Center has been closed for the past few weeks due to COVID-19. However, I would like to specify that at no time was it the Tarkio Nutrition Center’s responsibility to make another plan for these donated turkeys nor to notify the public of such a plan. Their only “responsibility” was that they offered to house the turkeys because they had freezer space when nobody else did. Due to the center’s closing, the Tarkio Chamber of Commerce was at a loss as to an alternative. I personally talked to a couple of chamber members the last two weeks, but we could not come up with any other place to take them. In the meantime, we felt it important for the article to still run because after all, there are still people in need. Even you realized this important fact of the need in our community for you went out of your way to go purchase turkeys even when you would’ve had a good excuse not to. As a sufferer of debilitating arthritis, I truly understand how difficult it is to not only get out and about in cold weather, but to carry such large and heavy objects again and again and again. I regret that you had to go to such lengths in order for your turkeys to get to the right place. However, I think the most important thing to remember is that they did get to the right place. Because of your kindness, two turkeys will be able to be enjoyed by people who may have not had any meat set upon their table this holiday season.

These are extremely difficult times and we should all be so grateful for the blessings that are given to us, whether by God himself or by HIS use of the people surrounding us. I do believe and in the past I have expressed my right to complain about certain businesses in the county on occasion. But I feel that in this specific instance the Tarkio Nutrition Center does not deserve a discredit, especially considering that they were doing the Chamber of Commerce a favor. I do realize that you did not know this until I told you when you brought your letter to be published – as most people didn’t – but you chose to still make it public so it would be an injustice to not explain the full circumstances along with your letter. If you want someone to blame, blame me (the person who typed the article), or blame the Tarkio Chamber of Commerce, or blame the newspaper who ran the article, but please remember that in the end the ultimate goal was achieved. A Thanksgiving blessing was bestowed upon an appreciative citizen, because of you, and that is all that truly matters.

Megan McAdams

W.C.,

I am writing to object to the widespread lockdowns due to the corona. They list many things that we cannot do. What they should be doing is listing what we can do!  Thanksgiving with no family present, next they will be telling us no Christmas! We cannot celebrate the birth of our Savior?  Instead of telling us what we cannot do, they should be telling us what we can do! That way we can compare what they say to our constitutional rights.

Thank you,

Jim Salmond