In this season of giving and goodwill, there is a food service organization doing good work. That work was highlighted at the Army-Navy college football game, this year held on Dec. 9 at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass., where there were tens of thousands of hungry football fans.
The Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 152 of North Kingstown held the Mother of All Tailgates, an annual event created by Dave Ainslie, a retired senior noncommissioned officer who now teaches at the Naval War College in Newport.
Ainslie started this “party with a purpose” in 2008 when, as he described in an interview, “a bunch of friends and I decided we would have a tailgate [at that year’s Army-Navy game in Philadelphia] and give away food for donations.”
At some point, the circle of friends widened to include some well-known names, including Texas Roadhouse, PepsiCo, Bacardi, sausage company Johnsonville LLC, and as befits this year’s New England venue, Isle Brewers Guild LLC, doing business as Narragansett Brewery.
There were additional local food makers feeding a few thousand fans. Newport’s McGrath Clambakes and Events furnished New England-style clam chowder for 3,000 people. In case you’re wondering, that’s 30 gallons. There is no official count on the number of quahogs, but it was substantial.
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PARTY WITH A PURPOSE: Fans gather during the Mother of All Tailgates event hosted by the Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 152 of North Kingstown ahead of the Army-Navy college football game at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass., on Dec. 9. Organizers give away food for donations as part of the event.
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Providing barbecue were two certified champions. Make You Scrum Barbeque from Newport and Waypoint BBQ from Somerset showed up early and fired up their smokers. Both are competitive barbecue champions as certified by the nationally recognized Kansas City Barbeque Society, known to insiders as KCBS. The thought process for executing this operation was to minimize the use of eating utensils. So, the barbecue masters were assigned to pulled pork and brisket taco duty. And from all reports, there was plenty to go around before kickoff.
While Johnsonville’s bratwursts were cooked in Narragansett beer, there was an ample supply for tailgaters from all over the country to toast with the authentic New England beverage.
The site in Lot 12-B on Route 1 opened at 10 a.m. on game day, a full five hours before kickoff. Also featured was an ice luge and live music. It was all free to anyone who stopped by, but the invitation was especially extended and enthusiastically accepted by many veterans, as well as active-duty military personnel and their families.
The benefit organization of the “party with a purpose” appears to be somewhat under the radar. Proceeds from the event were donated to Homes For Our Troops, based in Taunton. This is a publicly funded 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that builds and donates specially adapted custom homes nationwide for severely injured post-9/11 veterans to enable them to rebuild their lives.
Homes For Our Troops has built homes in 47 states. The homes are four-bedroom, two-bath, specially adapted, energy efficient, single-family dwellings of just over 2,800 square feet. Most of these veterans have sustained injuries, including multiple limb amputations, partial or full paralysis, and/or severe traumatic brain injury. These homes restore to the veterans some of the freedom and independence that they have lost, and enables them to focus on their family, recovery and rebuilding their lives.
The organization was started in 2004. Nearly 90 cents out of every dollar spent goes directly to program services for veterans. The homes are built where the veteran chooses to live. The organization continues its relationship with the veterans by staying in contact with each veteran after home delivery to assist them with rebuilding their lives.
Rhode Island put out the welcome mat to act as a host for the big game, especially for U.S. Navy personnel and their families, with midshipmen housed by the hundreds at the R.I. Convention Center, while the Providence Warwick Convention & Visitors Bureau served as the tour guide and event planner. Weekend events included a special WaterFire lighting in the basin of Waterplace Park and World Wrestling Entertainment brought a special Tribute to the Troops version of its “WWE SmackDown” show to the Amica Mutual Pavilion the night before the game.
“Dining Out With Bruce Newbury,” syndicated weekly on radio, can be heard in Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont and Indiana. Contact Bruce at bruce@brucenewbury.com.
