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Group Offers A Glean Getaway

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By YVETTE C. HAMMETT

yhammett@tampatrib.com

Published: December 17, 2008

SEFFNER - Back in 1995, Gene and Polly Shewfelt started a volunteer snowball rolling by picking the citrus in their own backyard to provide food for the needy.

After putting out the word they'd be willing to pick other fruit, even in farm fields, the snowball grew into Gleaners of Hillsborough County, with more than 200 volunteers.

Years later, Polly became ill, and the Shewfelts turned the organization over to others - but the momentum got lost along the way.

Then, in August, Polly Shewfelt died.

"I had a calling from God to get the thing going again," said Gene Shewfelt, a Seffner resident, who has trekked to fields in Pinellas, Polk, Manatee and Hernando counties in search of excess produce for the needy that otherwise would rot in the dirt.

With 11 volunteers, Shewfelt and his longtime co-worker, Gene Williams, loaded up 1,000 pounds of tomatoes from Wimauma fields Nov. 29 and delivered them to food banks, nursing homes and churches.

Meanwhile, the search is on for volunteers and for farmers willing to allow the gleaners into their fields, once crops have been harvested.

With the volunteer work comes a great feeling, knowing that the fruits of labor go to those who need them, said Williams, who first learned about the gleaners through his church, St. Andrew's United Methodist in Brandon.

Gleaning dates back to biblical times, when farmers let the poor into the fields to take the leftovers. Nationwide, gleaners working with the Society of St. Andrew pick 15-20 million pounds of food to help relieve hunger.

"It uplifts your heart when you walk into a nursing home with a box of tomatoes or fruit and they just light up," Williams said. "You feel that God's really with you."

Typically, the gleaners, now called Society of St. Andrew - Hillsborough Gleaners, recruit church groups to work in fields on Saturdays.

Each church has a coordinator to call volunteers and serve as a liaison with Williams or Shewfelt.

"There's a gap between June and October," Shewfelt said. "Otherwise, we try to be out two or three times a month, almost always on Saturdays."

HOW YOU CAN HELP

For information or to help in the fields, call (800) 806-0756 or call Gene Williams at (813) 651-3222. Online, write to geneshewfelt1@verizon.net or gwill2405@verizon.net.

For information on the Society of St. Andrew, visit www.end hunger.org.

Reporter Yvette C. Hammett can be reached at (813) 865-1566.

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