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CNN Live Saturday

Salvation Army Distributes Toys to Children Whose Parents Died on 9/11

Aired December 15, 2001 - 16:57   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL LIN, CNN ANCHOR: The Salvation Army has created a Christmas toy shop in New York City to benefit children whose parents died in the World Trade Center attacks.

CNN's Brian Palmer paid a visit to the shop and found a wonderland of toys and smiling faces.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Guys, just pass them on in now, please.

BRIAN PALMER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Toys don't usually make it to the top of a disaster relief checklist, alongside items like food, shelter, and warm clothing. But now that the basic needs of many World Trade Center victims have been addressed, a number of groups are focusing on the holiday-time wants of children affected by the attack. So instead of pails of water, this variation of a bucket brigade is carefully passing gifts hand to hand for these kids.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: "Hello, my name is Andrew and I want you to be happy and have fun with this present."

PALMER: Sharon Woolf drove this semi truck full of donated presents from Fort Worth, Texas to New York City.

SHARON WOOLF, CHRISTMAS IS FOR KIDS: I came in this morning about 5:00. And I had a highway patrol escort into town, all the way down, no red lights. It was really nice.

PALMER: Christmas Is For Kids, a Texas-based group, teamed up with the Salvation Army to distribute the toys from a vacant New York City department store. They run the show, but volunteers play key supporting roles.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Good morning.

JENNIFER SHERIDAN, CHRISTMAS IS FOR KIDS: Good morning.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How are you?

SHERIDAN: Good, how are you?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK. SHERIDAN: Jennifer Sheridan.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Jennifer, are you with a group?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Today, we're having many, many children come in from elementary schools around ground zero. And we're going to have parents who lost loved ones for getting toys for their children. We are going to have people who have lost their jobs...

PALMER: Jennifer Sheridan and friends got the day off to pitch in.

What are you going to do?

SHERIDAN: I am a shopping assistant. So I'm taking all the kids around, and pick my favorite toys, and convince them that's what they want.

PALMER: The kids themselves, however, have their own ideas. Each child gets to pick out up to three toys, or four, if she's really insistent.

Giovanni Guerrero became a Salvation Army volunteer at ground zero right after September 11. He's now overseeing the toy drive.

GIOVANNI GUERRERO, SALVATION ARMY: It's hard to describe what you see, because you see the joy in their faces when you bring out a toy.

PALMER: Perhaps better than describing the joy is watching it and listening to it.

Brian Palmer, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

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