Area bell ringers ring in money for charity
Published: January 4, 2006
Salvation Army kettle drives surpassed last year’s revenue this holiday season despite a shortage of bell-ringers and concerns hurricane relief efforts had tapped out prospective donors.
Marianne Neufeld of Adams, field representative for a 10-county region in South Central Wisconsin, said revenue already has surpassed the 2004 take of $132,000, and she’s awaiting more returns.
“People have been very generous,” she said.
Money dropped into the red kettles placed at area businesses will go toward disaster relief and programs for youths and seniors.
August Hohl, the Wisconsin Dells High School student who organized the ringers in the Dells area, said the drive here went OK. About 10 people rang the bells � mostly fellow students, but also a Briggsville man, Hohl’s father and a family.
Hohl said he’s “definitely going to try” to organize it again next year. While he hopes to double the number of ringers next year, he said he “wasn’t really disappointed” with this year’s turnout. Because it’s a volunteer program, you have to take what you can get, he said.
This was the first time Hohl organized such a large project. The main part of his work was getting the schedules worked out. He said many people asked him what times he had open, and he would tell them “it’s not what time I have open, it’s what time you want to go work.”
“On a personal level, it was the best thing I’ve done so far to help out my community,” he said.
While things going “wrong” prevented him from ringing himself more than once, he said when he was out he had a lot of fun talking to people. It was “really cold” the day he rang the bell, so there weren’t a lot of shoppers. Of the people who walked by, about 90 percent of them were generous, he said.
Hohl said he thanks the students and community members who helped, Wal-Mart for hosting the kettles, Neufeld and “everybody that transferred me from phone to phone to get to her.”
He hopes to see everyone again next year.
Herb Messer, who scheduled bell-ringers at six locations in Baraboo, said the Sauk County Salvation Army raised about $37,000 — an increase of about $2,000 from 2004. Donations came in a broad range of denominations, including one check for $1,200.
“We did get some sizable checks in this year,” Messer said.
The campaign’s success came as a pleasant surprise. Nonprofits feared prospective donors had exhausted their charitable resources earlier this year in supporting hurricane relief efforts along the Gulf Coast.
“We kind of wondered if people would be tapped out, but they seem to pull together if it’s for local use,” Neufeld said.
Sauk County Salvation Army Chairman Joe Dietenberger said up to 86 percent of the money goes to local organizations.
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