by Anne Gabbianelli
Special to The Weekly
“People are just trying to do what they can to help other people out.” And no one knows that better than 67-year-old Twila Greene of Dedham. On Sept. 22, Greene was travelling along
Hampden’s Western Avenue and was sleepy behind the wheel, crashing into the woods. The
crash actually created a dual rescue, that of Greene as well as all the donated food she was
transporting to HOME, a shelter and food bank in Orland.
For years, Greene has worked at HOME in the front office and whipping up miracles in the
kitchen. Before that, she cooked at Friends Camp in South China. And this past summer Greene learned Friends Camp was in need of a cook. “I told Sister Lucy at HOME I’d try it for a few days, but it ended up being eight weeks.”
Greene has a passion for cooking and baking. “I just turn out the product with goods others give me to work with,” she said, and her colleagues at HOME in Orland agree.
Autumn Woodward who lives and works at HOME has come to marvel at how Greene takes donated food and creates scrumptious meals that can serve upwards of 25 people a day at HOME.
When Greene’s car crashed, the priority was to get her out and to the hospital. “We actually
had to move food to get to her; there was so much of it,” said Lt. Jason Lundstrom of the Hampden Fire Department.
Once Greene was freed, crews regrouped to map out their second rescue mission. “There literally was over a thousand dollars worth of food,” said Lundstrom. “We needed to think outside of the box and this is where the community came together.”
Lundstrom knew he needed a team and it took just a few phone calls. “We had our guys, Sinclair Towing and Hampden Hannaford all signing on to the mission of rescuing the food,” he said.
Doug Sinclair and Robert Trask had to first haul the vehicle out of the woods and closer to the
road. Sinclair said, “When I arrived on scene, I could see food scattered all over; she had a load of it. The windshield was splattered with what I thought was blood.”
With a chuckle Greene said, “… that was the watermelon I had in the front seat next to me, and I guess the seat belt didn’t hold it too well.”
The food that was donated from the Friends Camp where Greene had worked all summer was offloaded from the car into the fire department’s pickup truck and brought to the station. “We had large amounts of meats, cheeses and lots of pastries; it was unbelievable the amount of high quality of food this woman was transporting to Orland,” said Lundstrom. He and officer Jeff Rice even went to Sinclair’s Towing later to get more food from the vehicle. “There was no way we could have walked away from that; it was too valuable.”
Erin Underwood, manager of customer service of Hampden Hannaford says, “I got a call from
Jason asking if it would be possible for us to store the food in the [store] coolers until someone could come pick it up — otherwise it would go to waste.”
Soon after, Green’s family gathered the food from Hampden and it arrived at HOME. “After
I heard about Twila’s accident, I never expected to see the food. When I saw what came
through the door, it was amazing; we had large pots full of minestrone soup and fish chowder.” Woodward said. “When people see someone do a good deed like that, sometimes it inspires them to help.”
For Greene, she never imagined her accident would lead to a dual rescue. “I thought the food
was all lost, and I was so glad when I heard what all those people did. I’m sure, at first, they
thought I had made a Sam’s club run,” she said.
While Greene is recovering from her injuries, her mind is already working on her next task. “The people at Friends Camp were so kind to donate all the food to begin with, so I need to be sure to get the pots and pans back to them for next summer,” she said.