Banquets Salute Legacy of MLK
BY REBECCA LURYE - RLURYE@ISLANDPACKET.COM
JANUARY 18, 2014 09:14 PM, UPDATED JANUARY 19, 2014 12:39 AM
Organizations in Beaufort and Bluffton remembered Martin Luther King, Jr., on Saturday with one of them honoring members of their communities whose actions have kept his spirit alive. The events are part of week-long celebrations of the civil rights activist's birthday.
In Beaufort
The Beaufort County Ministerial Alliance recognized two women at its annual banquet at Beaufort Elementary School, presenting the MLK Humanitarian Award to Lois Pigler Jenkins and Beverly Lawyer Berry. Jenkins, a retired teacher, and librarian, and mother of Beaufort County Coroner Ed Allen was honored for her community service, alliance president Sam Spain said before the banquet Saturday. "She has helped champion so many causes within this county," including helping orchestrate a World Day of Prayer, Spain said. "She has just been a jewel, a helper in the community." Berry, a manager on Spring Island, received her award for religion in recognition of nearly 15 years of missionary work in Jamaica. Berry has visited the country each year since 1999, bringing donated clothing and personal items to families and churches there. On her last trip in October, Berry delivered about 700 pounds of donations, alliance secretary Carrie Allen said. The annual banquet gives the alliance an opportunity to celebrate the man who championed the African American civil rights movement until his assassination in 1968, Spain said. "We just believe so much about what Dr. King stands for and what he fought so diligently to procure for not only people but people of color," he said. "So this legacy we must keep alive." The alliance will hold its annual parade at 10 a.m. Monday, starting on Rodgers Street. The closing program will follow at 11:30 a.m. at the University of South Carolina Beaufort.
In Bluffton
The Martin Luther King Jr. Committee hosted a banquet on Saturday at Campbell Chapel AME Church in Bluffton. The event's speaker, an engineer with the North Carolina Department of Transportation, said he was grateful for the chance to honor his Bluffton roots. Louis L. Mitchell, who also is a member of the Army Reserve, was inspired by the committee's theme for the weekend, "Insufferable struggle, shared legacy." He spoke on the importance of King's frequent refrain, "What are you doing for others?" "Oftentimes, we get siloed in, 'What's in it for us?'" Mitchell said. "But we have to open up our perspective, and ... try to live in peace and harmony with others." That, he said, will enrich the soul. The committee will hold a memorial service at 12:30 p.m. Monday at Bluffton Town Hall, followed by a parade at 2 p.m.
Thanksgiving Starts With Giving and Ends With Thanks
By DAVID LAUDERDALE
Beverly Lawyer Berry sees Thanksgiving in a new light this year. She is more thankful than ever, and it is because of her giving. Berry said giving has become an obsession. "I want to stop and I just can't stop," she said. It is rooted in her great-grandmother, the late Mary "Mamie" Lawyer of Hilton Head Island. As a child, Berry spent summers with her. The house on Wild Horse Road was brimming with 13 kids. She remembers the old Gullah woman saying, "Beverly, you give and give until you have nothing left to give." Berry also remembers paying attention when Mamie made her famous pound cakes. Berry turned to those lemony cakes drizzled with icing when she wanted to raise money for her first mission trip to Jamaica. Her outreach started simply, but she has become a shopaholic searching for bargains and filling storage units. On her first big trip, Berry took 14 duffle bags and suitcases, each filled with 50 pounds of shoes, clothes, and toys. Her second trip involved almost 100 large boxes and more than 2,000 pairs of shoes. This summer, Berry took a new direction, going to Africa with a Habitat for Humanity International team. In eight days on the ground, they built two small brick homes for widows caring for grandchildren orphaned by AIDS. Berry said you can see poverty on television, but not feel its weight until you see it with your own eyes. "A lot of things don't matter to me anymore," Berry said. "When I got back I called my two brothers and my sister and said, 'I want to let y'all know I love you and there's no more drama. I am drama-free.' It made me appreciate how blessed I am here."
'OFTEN ASKED WHY' Berry is a dining room supervisor at Spring Island, a private community in Okatie that has supported all her trips. She is a caretaker to people with special needs, opening her small home in Beaufort to the home-share program of the Coastal Empire Community Mental Health Center. And she is a philanthropist.
So is Spring Island resident Barbara Thomas, who led the Habitat team to Malawi in southeastern Africa. It was the 10th home-building team she has led to places including Poland, Macedonia, Armenia, Romania, Portugal and Costa Rica. She has learned dry walling and framing, but most of her 15 years with Habitat has involved skills learned from earning an MBA degree and a career in administrative management. "I'm often asked why do that, why go there, why not just send a check," Thomas said. "The answer is that there is a lot more to it than bricks and mortar. It's relationships and community-building. It's an uplifting experience for the people there and a learning experience for us." Berry used her exuberant personality, which has become legendary in her 21 years of working at Spring Island, to raise $5,000 more than her trip to Africa cost. And she took five suitcases filled with clothes, shoes, soccer balls, Frisbees of all colors, jump ropes, coloring books and crayons. 'MORE THANKFUL' When Berry saw families living in tiny homes with damp walls, no windows, dirt floors, leaky thatched roofs and no restrooms, she cried. "But Barbara said, 'Beverly, why are you crying? The people are so happy and joyful.' Then I viewed them from their eyes." Children made toys from things Americans would throw away. Villagers hauled in the locally made, kiln-dried bricks to the job sites. They also lugged the mud used as mortar. And the volunteers left homes with windows, cement floors, a tin roof and a latrine. Berry saw a widow take half of her dress to make a pallet to sleep on. And she thought of fussing at someone who got her sheets with a 350 thread count when they should have known she likes 500-count. She felt humbled, and in turn wants to thank all the churches, businesses and individuals who make her trips possible, led by Grays Hill Full Gospel Deliverance Church and the Rev. Norman Jenkins. Now Berry is packing for her next trip to Jamaica on Dec. 29. And Thomas is rounding up recruits for a Women Build team to be working in Delhi during International Women's Day on March 8. "While we worked, the Malawians laughed, sang songs and danced," Berry said. "It was a joy to work beside them. They were so full of life for having so little. "The thought of them humbles my soul and makes me more thankful for what the Lord has given me."
Interview with Ms. Beverly Berry (Click on the link below)
Beaufort resident on a mission to bring help to Jamaica
IslandPacket
dlauderdale@islandpacket.com
Published Monday, December 24, 2012
Thanks to Beverly Lawyer Berry of Beaufort for sharing the story of her special mission. Beverly is a native of Hilton Head Island and a supervisor in the dining room at Spring Island, where she has worked for 19 years. For the past 13 years, she also has worked with the home share program of the Coastal Empire Mental Health Center. "I AM MY BROTHER'S KEEPER" by Beverly Berry "If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth." 1 John 3:17-18 An eye-opening view of poverty in Jamaica touched my heart and inspired me to start a mission of helping those less fortunate than I. In 1999, I met two wonderful women from Jamaica, Pat and Audrey, who were working on Hilton Head Island as part of a temporary visa work program. We became good friends through sharing our life stories and experiences. They invited me to visit them in Jamaica. I gladly accepted the offer. Arriving on the island was an amazing experience. At Customs, native Jamaicans dressed in beautiful, colorful attire welcomed us with singing and dancing. Like most other tourists, I was immediately entranced with the visual beauty of the island. But later during my visit, I saw more than what the average tourist gets to see in Jamaica. I saw real people and real needs. My friends, Pat and Audrey, greeted me when I arrived, and we quickly determined how I would divide my stay between both of their homes. They and their families made me feel right at home and treated me like I was just another member of their families. After I settled in and rested, I was ready to begin exploring Jamaica. Over the three weeks there, I don't believe we missed seeing an inch of Jamaica. We visited Montego Bay, Bambu, St. James, St. Mary's, St. Anne, Mammee Bay, Negril, Grange Hill, Savanna-la-Mar, Spanish Town, White Hall, Hays Whithorn, Kingston, Brown Town, Ocho Rios, Alligator Pond and Runaway Bay. During my tour of Jamaica, I saw the beauty of the islands that one would see advertised on television or promoted in vacation brochures. Then, out of nowhere, the poverty of the people that is hardly exposed slapped me in the face. I had read about it and had seen some of it on television. But, when I actually saw it with my own two eyes, I was overcome with so much sadness that I cried. I witnessed young and old men, women and children fetching water from local rivers for home use. As they navigated the rough terrains of the Jamaican countryside, they would lose half the water out of their buckets before reaching their homes. I saw mothers cooking meals for their children on makeshift propane gas grills outside of their homes. Most of their homes were very basic with no electricity or indoor bathrooms. As soon as I got back to my friend's home, I knew I wanted to help make a difference in their fight against poverty. Each year since my first visit to Jamaica, I have adopted a family to help and encouraged my family, friends and church to help make a difference in the life of someone stricken by poverty. Scripture teaches us that we are our brother's keeper. Whether poverty exists here at home or abroad, we cannot turn a blind eye to the needs of God's people. Over the years, I visited and sent care packages to my friends in Jamaica, always passionately thinking about what more I could do to help. This year, I decided to do something different, something bigger to make more of a difference. Rather than putting together small care packages, I galvanized a missionary care package project to supply desperately needed clothes and shoes to help impoverished Jamaican families. I reached out to my family and friends, who donated clothes, shoes, and money to help with this mission. I went to Belk, JCPenney, Dollar General, The Shoe Department and other local retail stores and spoke with managers and sales associates about my missionary care package project. I was surprised and happy that they were eager to oblige me with the best deals in their stores. Sometimes they would call me when items went on sale. Using my great-grandmother's recipes, I baked and sold cakes and cookies to friends and family. I used this money to buy items and help pay for the trip to Jamaica to take the clothes and shoes. Over a year, I was able to gather hundreds of new and used pieces of clothing and pairs of shoes for infants through adults. As friends and I began sorting and labeling clothing, I realize it would be a challenge to ship the packages. I had a total of 14 duffle bags and suitcases weighing 50 pounds each that needed to get to Jamaica. I sent two bags earlier with a friend traveling to Jamaica. A couple of wonderful Christian women, who shared my devotion, paid the $325 baggage fee. I planned to take the remaining bags with me, but needed help. I called my father, Sam Campbell, and explained the situation. He immediately said, "I guess I better go with you to help with those bags." I had limited funds to ship the remaining bags. I contacted Delta Air Lines, on which I was to travel. Initially, the airline requested $1,600 to transport the bags. Only by the grace of God, and at the last moment, Delta agreed to transport the bags for a minimal fee. My father and I arrived in Jamaica on Oct. 2. Upon arrival, we worked with my friends to transport the bags from the airport to a local villa. Over two weeks, we distributed clothes and shoes through four churches in Jamaica. The people receiving the clothes and shoes were overwhelmed and grateful. But I was more touched that I could help uplift people who live in poverty every day of their life. I plan to continue helping poverty stricken families both here at home and abroad. I never imagined that reaching out to others in poverty would become my life's mission, but it is a mission that has allowed me to bless others and truly experience the joy of giving. I would especially like to thank Delta Air Lines for its generosity; the sales team at Belk in Beaufort, including store manager Ginger Olszewski, Hailey Krob, Katie Hall, Lisa Gibbs, William Tomes, Amekia Banks and Lakenya Green; the sales team at The Shoe Department in Beaufort, including Magaly Benjamin, Erica Evans, Tanaya Terry and Mary Johnson; Andy's Secret, Beaufort; Mobley's Shoe Repair, Beaufort; the Rev. Norman Jenkins and the Grays Hill Full Gospel Deliverance Church, Beaufort; the Rev. Ben Williams and the Mt. Calvary Missionary Baptist Church, Hilton Head Island; Gloria Murray, Morris Campbell, Sam Campbell, Spring Island residents, and many others who have helped to make this mission project possible. For further information, call 843-812-0134. Read more here: http://www.islandpacket.com/2012/12/24/2322000/beaufort-resident-on-a-mission.html#storylink=cpy#storylink=cpy
