A Journey of Generosity

In Los Angeles County, one in three children lives in poverty, and that tugs hard at the hearts of Dorothy and Joe Hudson.

Dorothy was 3, her sister a year older, when their father died. It was the Depression--a time of hardship, heartbreak and, in varied forms, beans. When Dorothy tells the story of her life, she begins with 1928, the year of her father’s death. He worked as an “insurance man,” so it was painfully ironic that when he died, he had no policy of his own.

For Dorothy, beans represented the depth of struggle, the slow, unsweetened passing of time, but in looking back at her life, they now serve as a reminder of meager beginnings. (Dorothy and Joe, retired educators, live in a home in Windsor Hills.)

Following her father’s death, Dorothy’s family moved in with her grandmother, a woman commanding great respect, sometimes fear. Maybelle Gibson was a slight, strong woman with uncompromising expectations when it came to children’s behavior.

She also was a woman of incandescent charity and faith who considered it a duty to help feed God’s lost children, dispirited drifters from the highway, arriving in Dallas with withered dreams, empty pockets and whatever hope their hearts still held.

“Sometimes we had beans every day,” she says. “I could cook beans every way you could imagine, and they were always delicious. We always grew a garden, so we had vegetables. It was simple food.”

When she was 13, she would linger on the porch to watch 15-year-old Joe Hudson deliver ice. The Hudsons were a big family, and Dorothy and her friends, in puerile lightheartedness, would take turns asking each other, “Which one of the Hudson boys do you like?”

Dorothy chose Joe, the sixth of seven children. He lived in a different neighborhood, three square blocks bordered on two sides by railroad tracks, attracting hobos seeking food in exchange for work.

His father, a college graduate, earned $9 a week as head custodian for Magnolia Petroleum Co. His mother took in laundry. “We knew that when chicken was put on the table, you had only two pieces at the most. It was not a matter of how hungry you were or how much you could eat. You shared.”

On a Sunday morning when Joe was 12, his mother died. Minutes before her heart gave out, she looked up at her husband and said, “Sam, make sure the kids are educated.”

Samuel Hudson was sincere in his reply, a promise that became his life’s endeavor. He worked hard and saved what he could. When the children wore holes in their shoes, he patched them with scrap leather.

He never owned a car until the seventh child graduated from college, and all seven of them pooled their money and bought him a new Ford. All 19 of his grandchildren are college graduates, and so far all of the great-grandchildren of college age are either in school or have graduated.

Joe and Dorothy were married in 1947 and left Texas in 1952, when the nearby home of a black family was fire bombed by racists. In L.A., they furthered the legacy of their parents and grandparents by dedicating their careers to children and education. Dorothy, 72, retired from teaching in 1984 but continues to do volunteer work in the schools. Joe, 74, retired in 1991 after 39 years in L.A. Unified schools.

Lessons learned in childhood remain a vital part of them.

Outside their home in a plastic bag, knotted on top and heavy with food, a 77-cent can of beans and a $1.41 can of chili await their journeys. Soon, like drifters that came and left, the cans will disappear into the unknown, representing past and present, prayers and hope for better days.

The Food Bank

The route is seven miles long. Kim Paul, 44, has been delivering mail here for eight years. He is somewhat of a throwback. He takes time to talk and listen. With tips he receives at Christmas, he buys stamps for those who forget to post their mail.

“Wouldn’t want anyone to have their lights cut out,” he says.

Some postal carriers grumble about the annual food drive because of the added work. Kim, however, looks forward to it.

“It feels good to know that you’re actually helping somebody and not being selfish all the time,” he says. “I know there’s people out there more needy than I am.”

The Hudsons’ home is near the beginning of his route. He expects they will have food waiting, as it’s usually the same people who give each year. He sees the bag and carries it to his delivery truck, the first leg of the journey.

By the time he’s finished, he has collected a couple dozen bags of food, a better harvest than last year. Some have given for the first time.

“I’m going to have to knock on a few doors to thank people,” he says. “They did good this year.”

Typically, the more affluent neighborhoods give less than others. Sometimes it’s those with the least who give the most.

Kim returns to the La Tijera station on Crenshaw Boulevard and unloads the food into a 55-gallon drum. As carriers return in mid-afternoon, they quickly fill 15 drums and begin pouring the cans into mail carts. One carrier found cans of green beans, peas and corn in a collection box.

This drive is the biggest of the year for the food bank. Last year, more than 160,000 pounds of food were collected. “There are a lot of small food drives, and while they help, they don’t put a dent in the total number of people we serve,” says food bank spokeswoman Amanda Cooper. “This one does.”

Donja Brooks and Manuel Cortez, who usually work in the food bank cooler, arrive in a Ryder truck to pick up the donations.

Donja, 24, an aspiring rapper, remembers when he was a kid and his mother sometimes needed help to feed the family. Manuel, 37, also understands what it is to be in need.

Seven years ago, the company he was working for went bankrupt. He had been making pretty good money as a foreman, enough to buy a home and cars for his wife and four children.

When he lost his job, he lost it all. He and his wife remain separated. He started at the food bank as a volunteer and was offered a job three months ago.

“I’ve learned to be happy without money,” he says. “It’s more important to help people.”

Behind the wheel of a forklift, Hipolito Delgado, 34, picks up the pallet containing the barrel with the Hudsons’ chili and beans. It weighs 150 pounds. He then whisks it to an open spot on the far side of the warehouse, where it will spend the weekend.

Hipolito speaks little English, but he makes his point well. To explain the importance he sees in his work, he extends his arms as if wrapping them around the world.

“One family,” he says. “Old, young, everyone, one family.”

The Volunteers

Volunteers begin arriving by 6 a.m. Monday. Thirty to 50 people work in two eight-hour shifts. They must go through the food can by can, eliminating those that are dented or too old to distribute. They wipe each can clean and place them into banana boxes for distribution to charities.

Three days after the food drive, 128,242 pounds have been brought in, but trucks are still arriving. Beeping, honking forklifts dart like nervous trout.

Donated items range from Maitre Jacques grained mustard with white wine to a partially used jar of peanut butter, which will be discarded along with other items that already have been opened.

Maria Gonzalez, mother of six, grandmother of 12, reaches for the Hudson’s can of beans, checks the expiration date, wipes it clean with a damp cloth and places it in a box along with other food. There is a box of cereal from one of the Hudsons’ neighbors, watermelon Jell-O from another.

The box is filled, covered and stacked on a pallet. Maria starts filling another and comes upon the Hudsons’ can of chili. Again, she inspects it, cleans it and places it in a box.

Maria has been a volunteer for six months and works here four days a week. Her husband is a handyman for a company that makes television commercials.

As a child growing up in Mexico, she and 11 brothers and sisters lived in a one-bedroom house. “No shoes,” she says.

The box with the beans is placed on the same pallet with the box containing the chili. They are stored in back, where they will await their turns for distribution.

Eight days pass. Volunteers are still pecking away at the food brought in by the drive. At the same time, food is going out to the charities, who call in daily. The total food drive figure is 129,894 pounds, 30,000 pounds less than last year.

Walter Barber is preparing orders. He has been at the food bank for five years, and this is the first time he has been able to hold down a job since returning from Vietnam, where he was an infantry soldier.

The war, he says, changed him forever, and he has spent each day since trying to place the horrors he experienced into perspective.

“Knowing that you killed somebody who didn’t do nothing to you, that’s the main thing you have to cope with,” he says.

The pace of this job keeps his mind occupied, he says, and for the most part, he works alone. His task is simple: He takes orders, he fills them.

The box with the chili goes on a pallet for St. Mary’s Place in Whittier. As he picks up the box containing the beans, he notices the bottom of the box is wet. A jar of spaghetti sauce has cracked, and some of the contents are ruined. The cereal and watermelon Jell-O are discarded. The beans survive and will go to the Beacon House in San Pedro.

Helping a Family

Two pick-ups arrive from St. Mary’s Place, which provides food and clothing for the homeless and others in need. They leave with 3,492 pounds of food for $231.87.

Some food is free, but most nonperishables are offered for 14 cents a pound. It’s called a shared maintenance fee to help the food bank cover expenses.

The following day, the food is divided into bags. The 15th person to arrive is Silvia Vazquez, who quietly receives her food. Ten days after leaving the Hudsons’ home, after being trucked and carried, sorted and packed, picked up and given away, the Hudson’s chili makes its way to its final destination.

Silvia’s husband has worked at the same place for 10 years assembling aviation parts, yet he receives no benefits. They have four children and are raising two nephews.

Their mortgage payment is $1,000 a month for the two-bedroom home. It was too hard finding a place to rent with six boys, Silvia says. Relatives helped them receive financing.

They have never been on public assistance. They are active in the community. Her husband coaches a youth soccer team. He doesn’t like it that Silvia brings home free food.

But, she asks, what else can she do?

They eat meat once or twice a week. Sometimes it’s wienie tacos. She tries to save money by periodically serving only salad or cheese sandwiches. She uses powdered milk. They eat at restaurants perhaps three times a year, and sometimes it comes right down to putting more water in the beans to make it until the next paycheck.

The children change their shoes when they come home from school, hoping one pair will last them the school year. The older boys receive an allowance of $1 a week. The younger ones receive nothing. Soon school will be out, and the grocery bills will be higher with them eating more at home.

Three days after receiving the food from St. Mary’s, Silvia opens it. She fries one potato and cuts it into thin slices then heats the chili and sprinkles a pinch of shredded cheese on top.

She pours the chili over the potato and serves it to a neighbor boy she baby-sits in the afternoons for a few extra dollars.

In the 22 years that she has been in the United States, she has been home to Guadalajara only twice. Her parents are getting old. If she had the money, she says, she would go back to visit.

“My husband dreams of winning the lottery.”

The rest of their dreams, like the dreams of Sam Hudson, are for her children. “Education,” she says, “careers.”

Second Chances

A man named Steve, 37, sits on the front porch of the Beacon House, sun-filled L.A. Harbor reflecting off his sunglasses. Right out there, he says, is where he worked more than 20 years as a commercial fisherman.

He loved being out on the ocean, sometimes two weeks or a month at a time. He has fished the coast from Mexico and Alaska. “I never believed I could work in an office, 9 to 5,” he says.

He made pretty good money, most of which was invested in an 18-year heroin addiction. He has been in and out of prison three times on drug-related crimes, and he may have to go back again on a parole violation.

He has been clean almost a year and has been at the Beacon House 10 months. He wants to get his captain’s license so he can run tugboats in the harbor, something he could never do before out of fear of drug testing.

He has lived in abandoned homes and parks, stood in soup lines. And now he lives here, taking inventory of the past, mapping a future. He steps inside the house for dinner.

Two days after the can of northern beans arrives at the Beacon House, it is being served for dinner. Residents share responsibilities and Thursdays are Bill’s days to cook. Usually, that’s usually good news for residents.

He has prepared a casserole mixing green peppers, creamed corn, beans, olives, onions and a variety of spices--baked at 350 degrees for an hour and a half.

“We’ll all be trying this together,” Bill, 66, says. “I made up the recipe last night.”

The Beacon House is home to 102 men. Unlike most of them, Bill has never been homeless. He says he did well in the business world, not so well when it came to vodka.

As the first residents begin eating, the casserole receives favorable reviews. “This is pretty good,” says one man. “What is it?”

Damn if Bill knows.

Jerry is 50 and splashes salt liberally over the casserole. In two nights, he will have been sober for six months, his longest period of sobriety since he was 13. Three years ago, his girlfriend found him passed out in a motel room. He had tried to drink himself to death, but even that wasn’t enough to change him.

He is here because no one else would have him around. The former trucker now says he only wishes he would have come sooner.

The men all have stories to tell about their journeys. So does the Vazquez family. And so do the beans. The Hudsons’ two cans both made it to people working hard to make it in America, people with children and dreams and, with a little help, better days.

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How You Can Help

If you wish to donate food, call LaTonya Fowler at the Los Angeles Regional Foodbank at (213) 234-3030, Ext. 130. The Foodbank also accept checks.