Volunteers have already started preparations for this year’s Community Thanksgiving. Grocery deals are being scoped out, duties divvied up, and the plethora of dishes claimed. This will be the 15th consecutive year an all-volunteer crew will host a free holiday meal at the Groton Community Center.

The annual tradition has been an area staple since 2010. Barb Paepke didn’t want anyone to have to celebrate Thanksgiving alone. She wanted to give people the option to join together with others over a traditional, sit-down meal on Thanksgiving.

“My wife came home one day, and she said, ‘I think we should do a Thanksgiving dinner.’ And I said, ‘Okay. We can try it.’ And it worked great,” said Tom.

 Barb and Tom Paepke may have had the initial idea, but they credit the volunteers for keeping it going. Each year, the number of volunteers increases, as does the attendees. From monetary donations to time, Barb and Tom are thankful for the caring people who make the meal possible, year after year.

“A lot of people will donate supplies. Which is great!” Barb said. “They can’t come and give their time, but they help that way. And we have a lot of friends that have given cash to help defray the cost, too. So, it all helps out.”

The first year was just the Paepkes and several of their friends. About 30-40 people attended that year, Barb said. Since then, their friends have been joined by new friends. The group has seen increasing community engagement from all ages.

“We’ve had some young people, call and say, ‘Can we help?’ We said, ‘Sure!’ We love to see the young ones get involved,” said Tom.

The hope is that the next generation will continue the tradition, said Barb. The meal has been steadily growing, both in attendees and volunteers. Last year, around 170 people sat down for a meal. While 20 people volunteered to serve the meal, more volunteers did work behind the scenes, Barb said.

The labor of cooking is spread among the volunteers. Most of the food is homemade and mostly in the volunteer’s home. There isn’t any place available that has the space to cook 18 turkeys, Tom said. So, the volunteers cook the turkeys at home, then bring the bird to the community center to be cut up and served. They have found alternatives for some of the more labor-intensive dishes.

“We used to do homemade mashed potatoes, but we were peeling mashing about 100 pounds of potatoes, and our workers said, let’s do Cash-Wa frozen potatoes,” Tom said.

The meal is a proper sit-down dinner, with decorations and all the fixings. The meal is served from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., and while reservations are requested, walks in are also welcome. Each place setting has a menu for the attendee to fill out. Then the meal is served, restaurant style. Reservations help the group plan how much food to make. There have been years when they ran out of food, Barb said.

Everyone is welcome, not just Groton residents, Barb said. People from all over the area, including Britton, Andover, and Aberdeen have attended the Thanksgiving meal. They have even served people from out of state, who were just driving through and needed somewhere to eat.

The Community Thanksgiving extends beyond the sit-down meal. Volunteers also take deliveries to area residents who request it.

“We make sure they have enough food, so they’ll have supper that night or leftovers, just like at a regular Thanksgiving dinner,” Barb said.

Freewill donations are used to cover the expenses, since the meal does get to be pretty expensive, Barb said. Any leftover money is split between the programs at the Groton school and city of Groton. Half goes to help offset additional school costs, such as school trips, for kids in need. The other half goes toward fuel assistance during the winter months.

“We can’t emphasize enough that without volunteers, we wouldn’t be able to do this,” Tom said.

If you want to help out, volunteers can call Barb and Tom at 605-397-6693.