CCF Toy Collection on Display

Christian Children's Fund
Tuesday, 13 March 2001

Christian Children's Fund (CCF) and the Simon Wiesenthal Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles are teaming up to put a face on humanity. Both share a common goal of sensitizing people to the downtrodden and oppressed. The Museum of Tolerance, the world's largest museum dedicated to preserving the memory of the Holocaust, is the first museum to host CCF's collection of toys made by needy children.

The Museum of Tolerance is sponsoring a gala reception on Sunday, March 18 at 3 p.m. to showcase the toys and photos of the Rights of the Child. The Museum of Tolerance feels that sensitizing the public to the horrors of the Holocaust and the murder of millions of people may help prevent genocide in the future. CCF feels that people will be able to identify with the needy children of the world by seeing the toys the children have made to play with. And once people identify with the children CCF serves, their hunger and poverty become real and meaningful...not just impersonal statistics.

The Museum of Tolerance is the first museum to exhibit the CCF toy collection with about 150 toys on display through April 30. From there the collection goes to the Dallas Children's Museum from June 1 through August 30; another 150 toys will be displayed at the Virginia Children's Museum in Portsmouth from May 1 through August 30. And the Museum of Tolerance and CCF are partnering to secure a New York venue for the exhibit.

The toys were collected after CCF president John F. Schultz was given a sailboat by a young child in Africa last spring. Schultz had complimented the boy on the fine toy boat he was sailing on Lake Turkana, a large salt water late in Kenya. As it turned out, the child had made the boat out of a discarded flip-flop sandal, two sticks, and a plastic bag. Schultz was overwhelmed with the child's generosity when he gave the CCF president his toy boat.

As he held the boat in his hands, Schultz realized the capacity toys have for helping people realize that needy children aren't mere statistics; that they aren't faceless; that a toy can make the plight of needy children very real because we relate. In the exhibit of the toys at CCF headquarters in Richmond, Virginia, visitors have found toys they themselves played with as children. They have related in a big way to the hopes and dreams of children who responded to CCF's request for toys.

CCF now has about 300 toys made by needy children worldwide. The story of the CCF toy collection was picked up by the Associated Press and has been featured in newspapers nationwide including the Washington Post. In addition, the toys will be featured in National Geographic in November. Some of the toys show the political upheaval that children are thrown into-toys such as the pull toy made by a child from East Timor. After the militia went on a rampage more than a year ago, children when to the dump in Dili to savage for food and anything else they could salvage. There, one child, Piedade found an old plastic bottle, a discarded flip flop which he cut up to make wheels for a pull toy. Some of the toys are geographic specific such as the toy ball and stick game made from the fruit of a Jacaro tree in South America. Some of the toys are universal such as soccer balls made out of plastic bags and heavy twine which are found not only in several countries in Africa, but in Latin America as well. And some of the toys show the hopes and dreams of children such as the "dream home" made out of banana fiber and cardboard by an impoverished child in Uganda. All of the toys show the resiliency of children and prove that we all share the common bond of childhood.

A BOAT FOR A BOAT CCF president John Schultz recently returned to Kenya and met with the child whose generosity started the toy collection. Schultz has since sponsored the child, named Akimat, and CCF has given Akimat's village a new boat-a 21 foot fiberglass boat with a 90 horsepower engine. This boat is being used to support the villagers' all important fishing industry. Specifically the boat will be used to go out and collect the fish that are being caught, thereby preventing the fishing boats from having to come in, thus lengthening the time villagers can spend fishing. Secondly, the boat will enable the village to protect itself from raiders from a neighboring country north of Lake Turkana who steal the villager's fishing catch. Scouts will be able to go out ahead of village boats and direct them to protected areas. A boat for a boat-after all, turnabout is fair play!

For more information, or to contact Christian Children's Fund, see their website at: www.christianchildrensfund.org