Evening Star Newspaper, December 21, 1930, Page 81

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- Bt. Nick. - attached to the letter and sent to a donor who John Duval Gluck, founder of the - Santa Claus Association. BY KATHLEEN READ. &anty Claus, North Pole. Dere Santy Claus: Please dom’t forget wus ¥ke you did last year. In all my life Tommy . @nd I have wanted roll skates and little Sue . @ doll what shuts her eyes. If you can’t bring @M this, a sack of candy will do. Your friend, JOEY. HE busy post office clerk smiles as he glances at the envelope con! this letter. Then he tosses it into marked 8. C. One thing he knows: Joey will watch this Christmas slip by as Joyless as the last one did. Times may be but there will be a touch of Christmas in Joey’s home. The Santa Claus Assoc will see to that. There was a day some 16 years such letters as the above slipped into box in childish faith and high expectal & source of genuine heartache to post cials and clerks. Each Yuletide THIRH TR ithe fluttering In by the thousands, sometimes be- grimed and finger marked and bearing varied sddresses: Santa Claus—North Pole—Ice Land regular guy who receives his letters in proper fashion and answers them in the most approved manner. The Santa Claus Association was instituted ot an earlier date, but it was not incorporated under the membership laws of the State of New York until 1915. It is the only charity of its kind in the world. It is the first charity to cause investigations to be made under the “Gluck class system”; that “.is, to investigate the poor by the medium of volunteer workers who are in the same station . ~of life. It is non-sectarian and non-racial. ‘The Santa Claus Association does not permit fts name to appear on any labels issued to donors. It permits no public drives for money. It is open to the public, to whom it affords an opportunity once a year to play Santa Claus direct and to know every dollar it expends is used for the purpose for which it is raised. It is the only charity that puts the donor in direct touch with the recipient. Tmsuthhememndmflnsmu Claus Association headquarters: The Postal Department is authorized by Uncle Sam to turn over to the Santa Claus Association every letter sent to Santa by what- ever name or to whatever address. Upon re- ceipt of the letters an investigation is made. ‘The investigation is to make sure that the home is one which might otherwise be overlooked by When the record is complete it is to play Santa to some of men and women in making the wish of a little child come true. There are some donors who cannot do the shopping themselves - and send money instead. The Shopping Com- mittee of the 8. C. A. takes charge of these ° ‘cases, but wherever it is possible the donor is ‘urged to assume the entire responsibility of the ‘Santa Claus role and thereby glean the com- plete satisfaction and joy involved in' the act of giving. s b ' Last year more than 10,000 donors came for- ‘ward to claim Santa Claus letters from the New York City t offices. A large number of the donors are iness men, whom the association THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, DECEMBER 21, 1930. Waiting to give the postman a letter to Kriss Kringle, telling him all about the doll she wishes for Christmas. dollars were spent on a single family; in an- other 500 children were taken care of by a childless donor. Bixty thousand letters were turned over to the association last year. Many of bore requests for clothes, food and of toys. “Toys are mighty nice, Santa, but it awful to be cold,” wrote year many more letters necessities of life will come in. childhood is wont to forget the things of play when the body is cold and stomach empty. years was one of the largest alms-giving organi- zations in the world. story of the origin of the association is an old one, but, like the Christmas story, will bear repetition. The Santa Claus Asso- ciation’s destiny was fixed when John Gluck postal clerks come upon a letter addressed to Se¢. Nick in a special 'Santa C uch, which is Ionundd to the Association. 3 “WHAT BECOMES OF SANTA CLAUS LETTERS? Every Missive Addressed to St. Nicholas Now Turned Over to Santa Claus Association by the United States Postal Authorities—Pleas of Thirty Thousand Needy Juveniles Answered Annually. ts it. Gluck turned back toward the shop- ct for new purchases, a shadow fell across his cantentment. This little fellow would be taken care of—he would know the thrill of an answer to his letter—but what found the only official channel available—the dead letter office. Thousands of childish dead mm! representing thousands of dead childish The man who never had a birthday of his It was not long before the entire Nation and its neighbor, Canada, became interested Santa Claus Association was swamped with re< quests. Its volunteer forces stretched in Wne ending- lines. Children from other countries, hearing of this benevolent American Santa Claus, sent pitiful little requests addressed to “Santa Claus, America, United States.” And sometimes the association found a donor who accepted an overseas charge. An article in the Santa Claus Annual, pub- lished each year by the association, states: “No center of population is too small or no city too large to organize or operate a Santa Claus Association. Under our decentralized system eacth community elects its own officers and handles its own funds. We never try to freeze out another Christmas charity, but co- operate instead. The kiddies’ Christmas is far P We are not the inventors of Christmas. We have only one program, the poor little kiddies. They are not beggars any more than the rich child and are entitled ta & . bit of festivity at this glad season.” Bmwphukwthqmvhoum . celebration has surpassed his wildest John Duval Giluck has a rich inheritance -of charity-minded ancestors. His grandfather, Johann Baptiste von Gluck, as a young man

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