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| Truck driver Bill Black drops off a skid’s worth of spaghetti for use by non-profit organizations in London.
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Messenger photo by Mike Munden
Seniors on the London High School football team unload pasta at the H.E.L.P House food pantry on Aug. 11: (from left) Zach Helman, Jordan Hawkins, Michael Peterman, Nick Newman, Justin Wolverton and Levi Johnson. |
| Black drives for West Side Transport out of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. |
A shipping error put plenty of spaghetti in pots around London.
The first week of August, independent truck driver Bill Black made a pasta delivery to GFS in Columbus. The grocery store refused one of the 17 skids of spaghetti because it was the wrong noodle thickness.
Black drives for West Side Transport out of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The company’s policy in such situations is to donate the refused goods to a community organization. It’s the driver’s responsibility to find an organization and make the donation before moving on to his next stop.
Black backtracked to the intersection of I-70 and Route 42 and spent the night at Travel Centers of America. The next morning, at breakfast, he inquired about the nearest town and who to contact about the extra spaghetti.
“They sent him to the London Fire Department, and then they called us,” said Jennifer Scaggs, a member of London High School’s Touchdown Club. “The fire department and EMS have helped with some Touchdown Club events, and they thought we could use it.”
The club holds dinners for football players on Thursdays and Fridays, so the pasta was welcome. But a skid of spaghetti goes a long, long way. One skid equals 120 cases of spaghetti; at 20 pounds per case, that’s 2,400 pounds of spaghetti.
So, the Touchdown Club made some calls. When they were done, the following groups were well stocked with spaghetti:
• London Middle School football
• A Friend’s House domestic violence shelter
• Sisters Nursing Home
• Madison County Senior Center
• London Fire Department
• London EMS
• Rainbow Girls/London Assembly 207
• HELP House food pantry (to which the bulk of the pasta went)
“It was very much appreciated. We will make sure we get it passed out to as many people as possible,” said Linda Blanken-ship, HELP House’s community coor-dinator.
