Hubbard man leads project to send 300 dozen cookies to soldiers overseas

Photo

By Harold Gwin

Project: Serving Soldiers has sent 2,000 hand-held games overseas over the last year.

HUBBARD — It’s not unusual for people to send special holiday packages to loved ones serving overseas in the military at this time of year.

Cookies are a common content in those packages, and a young Hubbard man is leading an effort to ship 300 dozen cookies to U.S. military personnel in Afghanistan and Iraq within the next few weeks.

Zack Lord, who graduated from Hubbard High School in June, is the founder of “Project: Serving Soldiers,” which he launched with the help of some fellow KB Toys store employees in November 2008.

Lord said he got the idea after learning from his brother, Luke, that a lot of soldiers weren’t getting any packages from home.

His family was sending Luke, who was serving with the Navy in Iraq, a couple of packages a month. Zack said he asked his brother during an e-mail conversation if everyone got stuff from home and was surprised that the answer was, “No.”

“It killed me that there were men and women over there fighting for us, and they weren’t getting any packages,” he said.

He decided to do something about that.

He spoke to his boss at KB Toys in Hermitage, Pa., about organizing an effort to send hand-held games to military personnel overseas, and his boss thought it was a good idea. So did his fellow employees who joined the effort and began asking people to buy little hand-held games for the cause.

They packaged up the stuff and sent it to his brother and others they knew who were serving overseas to distribute to their peers.

“We’ve sent 2,000 so far,” Zack said, adding that he’s received reports that the packages have boosted the morale of those on the receiving end.

This year, the group plans to send 300 dozen cookies.

It costs between $10 and $11 to ship each box, and Zack is looking for donors to “sponsor a box.”

Anyone wishing to do so and anyone who has a family member serving overseas who would be willing to serve as a distributor of the cookies can contact him at PServingSoldiers@yahoo.com or by telephone at (330) 550-1621.

Read the full story Monday in The Vindicator and on Vindy.com.