November 11, 2002

Texas Baptist Men prepare a kitchen
for New York Baptists to feed others
___By Ken Camp
___Texas Baptist Communications
___DALLAS--More than a year after terrorists attacked the World Trade Center towers in New York City, Texas Baptists are presenting a gift to New York Baptists to help them alleviate suffering in any future disasters--natural or manmade.
___Two Texas Baptist Men left Dallas Nov. 4 to deliver to New York Baptists a one-ton diesel "dually" pickup truck and a 40-foot trailer volunteers converted into a mobile disaster relief unit.
___The new disaster relief unit was slated for delivery to the annual meeting of the Baptist Convention of New York Nov. 7-8 at

CHARLES WADE, executive director of the Baptist General Convention of Texas, leads a prayer of dedication for the new disaster relief unit Texas Baptists are presenting to New York Baptists. Joining in the dedication are Donovan Phipps of First Baptist Church in Welch; Bob Dixon, executive director emeritus of Texas Baptist Men; Dick Talley of Lakeside Baptist Church in Dallas; Leo Smith, president and interim executive director of Texas Baptist Men; and E.B. Brooks, coordinator of the BGCT church missions and evangelism section.

Northside Baptist Church in Liverpool, N.Y.
___In the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, tragedy in New York City, Texas Baptist Men and the Baptist General Convention of Texas received more than $225,000 earmarked for disaster relief in that area. Texas Baptists sent volunteers to New York to help churches in the area and to assist with emergency meal service and chaplains for rescue and recovery workers at Ground Zero. Expenses ran about $135,000.
___Texas Baptists used most of the roughly $90,000 in unspent disaster-relief funds to build a new, heavy-duty disaster relief unit for New York Baptists. Baptists in New York had served meals to rescue and recovery workers from their own disaster relief unit until the small canteen-style rig "burned up" from overuse, said Leo Smith, president and interim executive director of Texas Baptist Men.
___Under the direction of Tommy Dulin in Harlingen, volunteers in the Rio Grande Valley worked for months on the trailer, customizing it into a mobile kitchen. The unit is modeled after the regional Texas Baptist disaster relief units.
___The new unit, equipped with tilt skillets, ovens, water purifiers, a generator and all the utensils needed for emergency food service preparation, will be capable of supplying up to 15,000 meals per day.
___Charles Wade, BGCT executive director, offered a prayer of dedication for the unit at an impromptu ceremony in Dallas before Dick Talley of Lakeside Baptist Church in Dallas and Donovan Phipps of First Baptist Church in Welch left to drive the truck to New York.
___Wade noted that more than 160 years ago, Texas Baptists benefitted from the generosity of New York Baptists when they appointed James Huckins as the first Baptist missionary to Texas.
___"New York Baptists sent help to us when we needed it, in the frontier days of Texas," Wade noted. "It is a privilege to be able to give back to New York Baptists all these years later."
___

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