All ages helped donate, helped pack food for Christian Service Center in Abbeville

The ages of volunteers who helped donate food, as well as, help pack the food ranged by as much as 80 years.
On Tuesday, an annual food drive was held for the St. Mary Magdalen Christian Service Center in Abbeville.
Volunteers arrived at the Winn Dixie at 5:30 a.m. and remained there until 6:30 p.m.
The volunteers helped set up tables and plastic containers at 5:30 a.m. The food began getting dropped off not long after that.
Robert Polk was one of the oldest helping Tuesday morning, at the age of 83 years old. The Korean veteran, who has lived in Abbeville since the 1960s, unloaded and sorted out groceries in front of Winn Dixie.
For the last three months he has been employed at the Christian Service Center. He works an average of 20 hours a week.
The food drive has come at the best time because the shelves at the Christian Service Center were almost empty.
“We needed it bad,” said Polk. “It came at a very good time.”
At 10 a.m., nearly 150 three and four year olds arrived at Winn Dixie with canned and boxed food to give.
The young students are enrolled at Precious Moments Headstart. For the last six years, 3 and 4 year olds are bussed to the food drive and each student places an item in a grocery basket.
Jane Melancon, the assistant site manager for Precious Moments, said the students are educated about where the food goes two weeks before they drop it off.
Deacon Randy Hyde, who runs the center, said last week the center had to close the day before Thanksgiving because there was little food.
Two days before, 200 families shopped at the center and needed most of the food that was available.
Tuesday night, Deacon Hyde had not yet figured out how many pounds of food the center picked up. He will have an amount by the end of the week.