Illustration by Tabitha Walters
By the time the first snowflakes fell in mid-November, 1,537 local children were wearing new winter clothes provided by Warm the Children. “We’re clothing more children than we have in many years,” says program manager Mary Stewart. “The children we serve are from all over Washtenaw County—Ann Arbor, Milan, Dexter, Saline, Chelsea, and Ypsilanti, as well as the townships—and the need is growing.”
For Stewart, it’s a legacy close to home: Warm the Children was created in the 1970s by her father, Mack Stewart. He was working for the Torrington News in Connecticut when he drove past a school bus stop on a chilly late-fall day and noticed children who had no coats, hats, or mittens. He vowed to remedy the situation, and, with the paper’s support, launched the first campaign. Then he began reaching out to newspapers all over the country, suggesting they run their own drives.
The Ann Arbor News was among the papers that answered his challenge. But the newspaper industry began facing hard times in the 2000s; some closed, and the survivors cut back on their charitable involvement.
When the News ended its support in 2017, the Kiwanis Club of Ann Arbor agreed to host the program and gave Mary Stewart office space. Its funding, however, comes solely from community donations. Each year, Stewart contacts seventy-eight schools and social service agencies to identify children in need. When the school year starts, she says, it’s a full-time job.
Related: Dropping in at the Kiwanis Thrift Sale
She also coordinates volunteers to help the children (accompanied by a parent, guardian, or social worker) on their shopping trip for coats, mittens, hats, and clothes. “Many of these children are from Spanish-, Russian-, Ukrainian-, Arabic-, and Chinese-speaking families,” she says. Since she started in 2012, more than 120 volunteers have shopped with local children. “One woman does between sixty and seventy families herself.”
Stewart keeps track of twenty-seven other Warm the Children projects around the country. They too “are reporting what we see here,” she says: “The numbers of children in need are rising.
“Ours is the largest program, serving the most children, but we all share the same commitment: to keep our children warm.”
For further information, or to donate to Warm the Children, contact Mary Stewart at mkcstewart61@gmail.com.
