Freeman Marine Equipment in Gold Beach, an iconic local business outfitting water-vessels throughout the world since it’s inception in 1975, held it’s annual Christmas party recently continuing a longtime local tradition.
Some time ago, Gary Nourse of Freeman Marine decided to help the local community and make their annual Christmas party a toy drive for their local ‘Toys for Tot’s’ program.
Over the years, what started out as a few toys has grown to be a large contribution to the program directed by the local United States Marine Corps Reserve distributing toys to children whose parents cannot afford to buy their children gifts for Christmas.
Freeman Marine employees each arrive at the annual Christmas Party with toys in hand, and with approximately 100 employees, that quickly equals a lot of toys.
This year they added another twist to the festivities, the annual ‘ugly sweater’ competition portion of the event turned into an ugly sweater auction. Attendees put their ugly Christmas sweaters on the auction block to raise even more money for the local charity. The best of the ugly sweaters auctioned off for $60.00, and after the auction was over an additional $225.00 was raised and immediately donated back to purchase even more toys.
This year Freeman Marine collected over $1500.00 in donations. “This is a tradition here at Freeman Marine” said Matt Flescher, “and we expect it to grow every year”. “Nothing feels better than giving back to our community” he went on to say, “especially for a good cause during the holidays”.
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