VETERANS PITCH IN TO HELP 1995 TOY BOX DRIVE HERE

Residents at the Missouri Veterans Home once again pitched in to help underprivileged children by helping to make wooden toys for the annual Toy Box toy drive, sponsored by the Cape Girardeau Jaycees and the Southeast Missourian.

Veterans sanded and varnished the wooden rocking horses and doll-size high chairs carved by Lester Harris of Fruitland.

The wooden toys will be among those distributed by Jaycees Santas on Dec. 21.

The veterans will probably never meet the children who receive the toys, but that's all right, they said.

"I hope the kids enjoy them," said Bill Walker, one of the residents who helped make the toys.

Walker said the residents set up a miniature "assembly line" to make the process more efficient.

"I've been doing this for almost five years," he said.

"I think we're pretty well caught up on orders now," said resident Ken Burcham, who also helped make the toys.

Donations are still needed to fill Toy Box requests from children. More than 400 applications for assistance were received, and donations have been slow this year, Toy Box organizers say.

New, unwrapped toys may be dropped off at Boatmen's Bank, Capital Bank, Coldwell Banker, Gulliver's Travels, Commerce Bank, Mercantile Bank, First National Bank, Chuck E. Cheese's, West Park Mall or the Southeast Missourian.

Donations may be mailed to Toy Box Trust, P.O. Box 4, Cape Girardeau, Mo., 63702-0004.