Locally-owned businesses such as Stick Boy Bread Company are selling the “Christmas in the Mountains, Volume 3” CD, produced by the Hunger and Health Coalition. Photo by Christy Bullins

by EMILY MELTON
Lifestyles Editor

Produced by and benefiting the Hunger and Health Coalition, the third volume of their “Christmas in the Mountains” CD is being sold for $10.

Mostly for sale at businesses in Boone and Blowing Rock, the CD can be found at 73 locations, including Appalachian State University’s Bookstore.

“All the proceeds from this year go to our new initiative – it’s called End Child Hunger in the High Country,” Hunger and Health Coalition Fundraising Chair Leslie J. Shavell said. “The children are the victims of this horrible economy we’ve got, by no fault of their own.”

Funds collected will allow the Health and Hunger Coalition to double the amount of food given to families and to set up a new program that offers supplies to new mothers, including baby food formula, diapers, vitamins and medicine.

“Kids used to come to the back door of the Hunger Coalition because they were hungry,” Shavell said. “We make up little bags with, say, an apple or a granola bar – something that’s healthy, and we give them out to the kids when they come to the back door. They can come anytime they want, especially after school, and get a little snack."

Funds will also help sponsor the Health and Hunger Coalition’s Backpack Club, in which backpacks filled with food are given to needy students.

“We have 50 backpacks,” Shavell said. “We pack them every week and then we take them to the schools. On Fridays, we give them out, and on Mondays, the students bring them back.”

Because profits from the first year of CD sales totaled $20,000, and profits from the next year brought an additional $40,000, the selling of the CDs has become the most successful fundraiser the Health and Hunger Coalition has had.

This year, because of the poor economy, Shavell expects to raise approximately $30,000. 

She said the amount of clientele who benefit from CD sales has doubled since 2007.

“Child hunger in the High Country is more prevalent than one would think,” Hunger and Health Coalition Executive Director C. Compton Fortuna said. “It’s certainly a hidden problem. You don’t see people on the street asking for money, but there are many families with limited resources.”

Fortuna said some residents initiate various strategies to feed their families, feeding, for example, their children on one night and allowing other family members to eat the next.

“It’s an awful situation,” Fortuna said. “They’ll eat cheap, unhealthy foods with higher processing, giving them an increased risk for health problems, not to mention that it’s far more expensive to pay for a health problem than healthy food.”

Communication Lecturer Steve Smith and wife Ruth have been playing music together since marrying 34 years ago, and because Steve teaches audio production, the pair has a recording studio in their home.

After releasing their own Christmas CD, “An Appalachian Winter,” last year, they saw the Health and Hunger Coalition’s CD and became interested in contributing to the next volume.

Their first time contributing, the CD contains their individually produced version of “Carol of the Bells,” Steve playing guitar and Ruth playing the hammered dulcimer, a wooden, trapezoidal-shaped string instrument.

“We let them choose anything they wanted from our current CD and that’s the one they picked, thought it would fit in with the other songs,” Steve said.

Along with Steve and Ruth’s “Christmas in the Mountains, Volume 3” features various local artists performing traditional instrumental and vocal holiday selections and will be on shelves until Jan. 1.

Photo by Rachel Bullins  |  The Appalachian

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