Source: City of Broken Arrow
For nearly 19 years, the Broken Arrow Blue Star Mothers have been meeting monthly and preparing between 100-300 care packages for service members across the world, with a mission to “Support our troops until they all come home.”
This week, Broken Arrow Blue Star Mothers also began shipping care packages to the U.S.S. Tulsa, one of the nation’s newest, most advanced warships in the U.S. fleet commissioned in February 2019. Currently, two service members serving on the ship are from Oklahoma.
According to the Tulsa World, the USS Tulsa is an Independence-class littoral combat ship, meaning it’s designed to patrol coastlines. It’s only the eighth ship of its type in the entire Naval fleet.
“We will be packing the care packages for the U.S.S. Tulsa on Tuesday, Feb. 22 at 6 p.m. at the Broken Arrow Veterans Center, 1117 S. Main St.,” said Susan Thesenvitz 2nd Vice-President of the Broken Arrow Blue Star Mothers— Chapter 5.
Fifty boxes are going out to the 105 crew members of the USS Tulsa. Each person will receive a gift bag filled with goodies such as snack foods, travel-size games, Easter eggs filled with candy, and hand-written notes from area school children.
“We have 150 additional boxes going out this month over our normal shipment,” Thesenvitz said.
The Blue Star Mothers volunteers have children serving or that have served in the military. However, you do not have to be a member of the organization to volunteer to fill care packages.
Other volunteers assisting with this shipment include Broken Arrow Mayor Debra Wimpee and members of the and Girl Scout Troop #667. Also included in the shipment are three separate boxes filled with Girl Scout Cookies.
According to Thesenvitz, any business, organization, or individual that would like to volunteer should contact 1st Vice President Christy Brown at babluestars@yahoo.com or call the office at 918-259-9479.
“For students needing to fulfill volunteer hours, we are a recognized non-profit organization and can provide the necessary documentation of service to the community,” she said.
Every year, the 501(c) 3 organization relies on donations and four annual fundraisers to pay for the hundreds of care packages they send out to active-duty military service members. And their monthly number of packages a month triples at Christmas time.
“We are sending them love from Oklahoma,” Thesenvitz said. “We want them to know we love and support our troops and want them to come home safe.”
For more information go to Broken Arrow Blue Star Mothers.
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