Albany radio station’s listeners respond to toy drive
Staff Photo: Tara Dyer Stoyle
By Carlton Fletcher
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ALBANY — When Tara Dyer Stoyle arrived at the Pretoria Fields Brewery just before 6 a.m. Saturday morning, her disappointment was hard to hide.
Stoyle had been asking listeners of the WPFQ radio station inside the brewery to donate toys to the station’s Toys for Tots drive for a few weeks, and only a handful of items were in the familiar TFT box when Stoyle arrived for the start of a radio marathon to promote the toy drive.
But by noon, when the brewery actually opened, toys had been delivered by the dozens by listeners of The Queen Bee station. And they just kept coming. Listeners from as far away as Tifton and Moultrie made the trip to Albany to deliver toys, and local listeners opened their hearts and pocketbooks, delivering more than 200 toys and in excess of $200 in cash to Marines who volunteered to stand guard and accept the toys on behalf of the program, administered in Albany by Marine Corps Logistics Base-Albany and the Salvation Army.
“I’ve said since we went on the air that we have the best listeners around,” Stoyle, the WPFQ station manager, said. “It was so amazing to see the response to our toy drive. Talking with some of the listeners who delivered toys really touched me. And the greatest thing is a lot of kids in Albany and southwest Georgia who otherwise would not have had a very happy Christmas are now going to.
“There was a lot of stuff going on around the toy drive, but that’s what it really was all about.”
Over the course of Stoyle and other WPFQ personalities’ radio marathon that started at 6 a.m. Saturday and carried into Sunday, Marines talked about their pride in participating in the Toys for Tots program; listeners talked of their desire to support the radio station’s efforts and its quest to collect toys, and even Santa Claus made a visit.
“I listen to The Queen Bee all the time, and I wanted to support the station and also do something for kids in the region,” Brian Collins, a listener who rode his motorcycle to Albany from Tifton to deliver his donation, said. “It’s all about those kids getting a little joy at Christmas.”
Staff Sgt. Juan Escovar, who stood watch and accepted donations at the brewery for a six-hour shift, said he volunteered to be a part of the program as a way of giving back to the community.
“The ideals of the Marine Corps are the same ideals that lead people to give to a program like this,” Escovar said. “I am honored to be a part of it.”
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