To the Editor:

The Potsdam Interfaith Thanksgiving Program (PITP) wishes to thank the numerous individuals and organizations that helped make our 2014 Thanksgiving food basket project a success.

In our first joint venture, five congregations -- the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, United Methodist Church, Congregation Beth El, St. Mary's Church, and North Country Community Church -- provided baskets to 158 families, a total of 533 people.

We plan to increase the number of congregations and volunteers involved -- and to serve more families -- as we look toward Thanksgiving 2015.

We would need pages and pages to list all our helpers, but we want to recognize the following for their efforts:

For food drives: the AAK Interact Club, Kiwanis Kids groups, Knights of Columbus, and various community members.

For donations: Potsdam Lions club, Potsdam Elks Lodge, the Ministerial Association of Potsdam, PITP member churches, and community members. Walgreens headed the milk donation program, whereby the community donated all of the milk used. Subway provided cocoa for the children, and Walmart provided the location for a food drive. Cleaning and maintenance staff from Satterlee Hall at SUNY Potsdam collected boxes for the food items.

For set-up, food packing, distribution, and delivery: the LDS Church, which provided space to store and distribute food; St. Mary’s Church, which provided storage space; the Lions, Elks, and K of C members who helped with packing and delivery; Boy Scout Troop 77 for bagging and packing potatoes and apples; college students from Clarkson Air Force ROTC, Alpha Phi Omega Fraternity, Beta Tau Fraternity; St. Mary's Newman Club.

And thanks to the many volunteers from churches and community who gave of their time freely to help with packing boxes and transporting them from one church to another, and to the table and floor workers and outside workers on distribution day.

Patricia Reichhart & Faye Simmons, co-chairs of the Thanksgiving basket program.