The Voice of the Community Since 1909, Serving Moorcroft and Pine Haven, Wyoming
The Voice of the Community Since 1909, Serving Moorcroft and Pine Haven, Wyoming
Food pantry volunteers prepare meal boxes for families.
The Moorcroft Interfaith Community (mic) pantry served 416 households for Thanksgiving this year, which will translate to about 1200 meals as we average about three persons per household. These households come from all over Crook, Weston and E. Campbell counties.
This is an all-time record for households served for any pantry, eclipsing the 2023 Thanksgiving pantry, which served 369 households, and 361 households served in 2022.
We had youth and adults from First Southern Baptist, Moorcroft branch LDS, 3rd Ward LDS Gillette, First Presbyterian and the Beef & Bridle 4H club, plus several families who showed up to help.
Approximately 60 youth and 20 adults participated in filling food boxes. We filled them in less than an hour and a half.
The volunteers were invited to a community thanksgiving worship and supper at first presbyterian prior to the filling of the boxes. Over 100 persons were served at that meal.
Each box contained about 50 lbs of food for a holiday meal including green beans, corn, honey, jelly, peanut butter, cranberry sauce, black olives, corn bread mix, mac and cheese, egg noodles, spices, pudding mix, canned fruit, crackers and more.
Each household was given a choice between a 12-14 lb turkey or a 9-pound spiral cut ham. Additionally, they received eggs, salads, cheese, cauliflower and potatoes.
On Thursday for the distribution, we had volunteer youth from the high school and 6th grade led by Mrs. Thomas, who helped bag potatoes and distribute boxes during the drive through. We had a line across the MTC parking lot, down the hill and several blocks long by 3 p.m., so we started early and continued until 6 p.m. without a drop-off of clientele.
We had put together 400 boxes to begin with but by 5 p.m. it was obvious we were going to run out, so we started filling more boxes.
Thankfully, we had enough food that no one was turned away without receiving food.
The Moorcroft Interfaith Community Food Pantry provides pantries on the 1st and 3rd Thursdays of each month throughout the year. The third Thursdays of November and December are larger as MIC helps households prepare for the holidays.
MIC plans to continue to help food insecure families in NE Wyoming into the future.
