holiday joy and i was there watching families who had no idea who they were going to be able to go do and pick out presents for their kids to include bicycles. griff: we are seeing that now. that s where you were. it s a wonderful opportunity for these young folks to be able to do things to make their life a little bit better and what a wonderful time of the year when you want to have time with family and make a difference. griff: it s not just the corporations. you can see on the screen for anybody that wants to go and donate, it s asymca.org. like ymca but armed services. ymca.org. they can contribute as well. thank you very much for what you re doing and merry christmas. asymca.org is the website. you go there and contribute. that s it for us. i want to say thanks, aishah for joining us. i want to take two seconds
nation for a long time and you got out and decided to find another way to serve by doing the armed services ymca, you have been doing it now, what, eight, ten years, why are you doing it? if you can t be in on active duty supporting folks, i think t this is the next best jb to have. i got too old to serve on active duty and now i get to work with service members every day and you can imagine how rewarding it is to see the folks and their impact and at the end they are the ones that protect our country, our nation and one way to give back to take care of those who truly take care of us. griff: put you on the something, admiral, was there ever interaction with a family member through operation holiday joy or service member that got a ride home that you were able to meet that said, thank you, that you could see the impact it had? it happens all of the time but i was in camp penalton at
to navigate its way out of an historic pandemic. let s bring in sam brock with this because sam, you met up with a military family whom you spoke with last year who were struggling to put food on the table at the time. what did you hear from them now on this memorial day? reporter: jeff, just gratitude, honestly. when we met rachel zabo back in december, she was going through tough times and had lost her job like so many across the country. she s landed back on her feet and her story moved so many, jeff, that there were record breaking donations to the armed services ymca and now it s a message of hope. rachel zabo is back on the job, a designer who moved to fort bragg two years ago when her husband joined the army. like many americans, rachel is working from home, taking care of her 5-month-old son, andrash and giving back working at a
tough. we were floored. i worked in non-profits for 20 years. i have never seen a single day of donations like what we saw. reporter: $300,000, five times what the organization received in online donations for the previous year. the influx of new money going back to help still reeling pockets of the country, coping not only with empty cupboards but roadblocks finding childcare. an issue rachel is confronting. childcare is not cheap. it s not. you have to have a job that pays for day care but also can pay for your groceries and your bills and that on top of it. reporter: it s another obstacle the armed services ymca is tackling along with the u.s. military. our partnership is vitally important. the military we couldn t do what we do without the military leadership. reporter: rachel has been back at work for more than a month. her tears replaced by hope. with a regular paycheck, food
Armed Services YMCA Celebrates National Military Appreciation Month and 160 Years of Helping Military Families
From Humble Beginnings of Civil War Aid from Volunteers like Walt Whitman to Delivering More than 2M Pounds of Food to Military families
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WOODBRIDGE, Va., May 13, 2021 /PRNewswire/ For the past 160 years, The Armed Services YMCA (ASYMCA) has remained a constant in the lives of military families: on the home front and during deployment, when transitioning between bases, and in times of conflict and peace.
Letter of Thanks from Abraham Lincoln
The oldest military support organization in the U.S., the ASYMCA has been