Sharing a gift of warmth

For almost a decade, every winter, Dark Horse student Evan Gillespie makes her rounds throughout Clinton City Schools to bring warmth and a gift of Christmas spirit to her peers — a birthday project she calls Warm Hands, Warmer Hearts.

Those birthday projects are part of a long-running tradition that each of three Gillespie children — Olivia, Evan and Tripp — began at the age of 10. Its origins started with the eldest, Olivia, when she began gathering donations for the Backpack Buddies program through her project ‘Insecure No More’.

Each year, instead of birthday presents, the Gillespie siblings seek donations from the community in an effort to give back to those in need rather than receiving gifts themselves.

Fulfilling that simple desire is what brought Evan Gillespie out to LC Kerr and Butler Avenue schools last Wednesday morning, Dec. 18, for Warm Hands, Warmer Hearts. While Olivia and Tripp gather food items to donate to the city schools food pantries, Evan’s approach is a bit different.

With her donations, Evan finds and purchases gloves for students who may be in need or don’t own any, an early Christmas present to keep hands warm, delivered from a warmer heart.

Now a senior at Clinton High, this year marked not only Evan’s ninth delivery but her biggest collection to date. The final count for gloves collected reached an astounding 1,913. While it’s customary to gift gloves in Sampson County, Gillespie said she did something extra special with this year’s project — donating pairs to Hurricane Helene victims.

“This year I decided with everything that happened in western North Carolina with Hurricane Helene, that I wanted to turn my point of focus over to Yancey County,” she said. “They were hit very hard and my mom had contacts near there in Burnsville.

“Basically, we reached out and we got the numbers for schools, one of which was actually condemned, and since I couldn’t make it out there, we looked at the numbers and we collected that amount of gloves. Then my parents and my Mimi (Gloria), they all helped me package the gloves, they boxed them up and delivered them down to Yancey County.”

Back at home, it was the youngest of group of Dark Horses who received that same generosity. While not the most talkative, that did little to hold the youngsters back from expressing their joy on getting an early Christmas present — smiles bright and excitement easily recognized by their squeals of delight.

“So class, tell me how do you guys feel about being able to receive your gloves?” Deirdre Moore, Butler teacher, asked her class.”

The responses, a pure sign of gratitude, demonstrating the name of Gillespie’s project — warming the heart.

“It feels good; I’m really thankful,” Landon McDowell said.

“I’m happy because I really like gloves,” Matthew Wheeler chimed in, excitedly.

“It makes me happy, too, because I really need gloves,” Raylen Johnson added, a smile lighting the student’s face.

Moore was as excited as her young charges.

“This is truly a blessing. I’ve been here 25 years and I’ve watched her donate these gloves for a longtime,” Moore recalled. “A lot of kids don’t have gloves, and this really helps. We take for granted, sometimes, the things we have that our students may not, which means a lot to them. And you can tell by how excited they get when she brings them.”

Moore was among many teachers who showed student-sized grins as Gillespie dropped off gloves to their classrooms. Some were even teachers Gillespie had when attending these very schools, and each shared a sense of a pride for her impact on the community.

“Well, we are so proud to call Evan Gillespie one of ours,” noted teacher Rebecca Hales. “She has worked hard from just a little girl to help impact the lives of other children in a such a positive way. The impact that she’s had on our community is unmatched, and we can’t wait to see what the future holds for her.”

Her former first-grade teacher, Laura Glover, noted Gillespie’s natural nature for giving, compassion she’s held since being in her class.

“She has the warmest heart,” Glover attested. “She is so compassionate and caring for others, and she has been that way since she was in first grade. She has always wanted to do for others, and I know she will continue doing for others the rest of her life because that’s her nature. She’s born to be a leader and she is born to help others; that’s her mission in life ,and she’ll do fantastic.”

Coincidentally, that same morning, Clinton City Schools administrators were wondering the halls at Butler judging the Christmas-themed doors contest. No strangers to the Gillespie family’s kindness, they halted judging just to speak about Evan.

“She is a phenomenal student and she has done a lot for the community,” remarked Dr.Theresa Melenas, executive director of Instructional Services. “She truly understands what it is to be service-oriented. That’s been instilled in her from a really young age. So we’re super proud of her and we’re glad for our Dark Horses because they just give of themselves. And Evan, she is the true definition of what it means to be a Dark Horse.”

Superintendent Dr. Wesley Johnson agreed.

“For Evan and and her family, this is very typical,” Johnson said. “They go above and beyond the call to give back to our community. It’s always great to know the thing that we teach here in Clinton, to give back to the givers, grows in our students. The Gillespies, they do a great job of carrying on the tradition of their birthday projects, so it’s great to see it again. We started with their sister Olivia, and it’s carrying on through Evan and now to her brother. We really appreciate them and all that they are doing.”

For Butler Avenue Principal Dr. Angela Harding, there was no greater feeling than knowing her students received a gift of warmth.

“It’s great to know that our students are going to have gloves during this season and this time of the year, because there’s such a need,” she said. “There’s so many families that go without, and just to know that we have a student from Clinton City Schools who loves to donate to other students, in their time of need, is just a blessing. I’m just so grateful to have Evan as a part of our Dark Horse family.”

While there was plenty of thanks, compliments and praise lavished on Gillespie for all her efforts, the teen made sure to express her own thankfulness to the community, who, she noted, was instrumental in making her donations possible.

“Oh, yes! I would like to give a shout out to Cameron (Dunn), my youth pastor,” she said. “He checked in with me and made sure that I had enough gloves to give to Butler and I definitely could not have done that without him and without support from all of my church family at Grove Park. I also had an anonymous donor last year who gave $1,000 that me and Tripp split to help collect items for our projects this year; I’m so grateful for that.

“Then, obviously, my family, this is definitely impossible without them every year,” she attested. “They helped me so much; it’s definitely a group effort, and one I couldn’t imagine doing without all of us. I’m about to graduate, but hopefully, I can do it one more year, just to round off the decade, that’s what I’m hoping.”