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LINK Volunteer Gained from Giving
Volunteer Gained from Giving
By Mark Gunderman
LINK Board Member
Sterling Park, VA.
Dear Friends of LINK,
We invite all of you and anyone from your church community who knew Roberta, to the dedication of a Dogwood tree in her honor on June 24 at 7 PM. The Dogwood tree has been planted next to the LINK Food Pantry in Herndon. This living memorial will be a testimony to the blessing that Roberta Bruckschen was to LINK, to Christ the Redeemer Catholic Church, to so many people, and our entire community. Father Donald Howard from Christ the Redeemer will participate in the Tree Dedication.
Please join The LINK Family at 7 PM at the Pantry for a brief remembrance and dedication. We will serve lemonade and light food.
This article is a tribute to Roberta Bruckschen, a dear friend to all of The LINK Organization and our community. “Roberta was a special lady who helped so many people in our community. She was Ms. LINK serving those in need even when she became ill,” said Herndon resident Joy Trickett, past president of LINK. When Sterling resident Roberta Bruckschen was in LINK’s food pantry stocking the shelves, she wanted to stay there.
“It’s addicting. You get in there and you just can’t quit,” said Bruckschen, a LINK volunteer in the early 1970s who returned to the nonprofit, all-volunteer organization in the late 1990’s. “I had a lot of time to get involved with people in need.” Roberta, after retirement, served as the food pantry coordinator year-round, putting in an average of two to three hours a day until the holiday season, when she worked about eight hours a day.
“She was open to helping people out. It didn’t matter if it was night or day or the weekend. She just cared about other people,” said Herndon resident Carol Lavery, past vice president of LINK and a volunteer for the organization for 13 years. “For the small detailed things, we know we could call her. We knew she would find somebody to assist.”
Roberta made sure the pantry was staffed with volunteers — two people to rotate answering the phones every two weeks and four people to load up boxes of food for delivering to needy families in Ashburn, Sterling and Herndon 52 weeks a year. She found at least one person to pick up food from the Sterling Park Safeway four days a week to deliver to the pantry, the homeless shelters in Loudoun and Fairfax counties and a subsidized housing unit in Sterling Park.
“It’s good there are organizations out there that can help. We have assisted many people who suffered a job loss or other trauma,” over the years,” Bruckschen said. “Some of the families we assist with food help to loosen up some of their money to pay bills and buy medicines,” Bruckschen said.
LINK’s 14 member churches take turns each month collecting and delivering food to the needy. One of these churches is the one Bruckschen attended, Christ the Redeemer Catholic in Sterling. Before LINK organized in 1972, Christ the Redeemer fixed food baskets for the needy, sometimes overlapping the work of other churches by delivering to the same families.
LINK formed in 1972 when five churches decided to coordinate their efforts and avoid the double deliveries. “Lots of Churches did it, that’s why we started working together,” Bruckschen said. After LINK was established, Roberta volunteered with the organization, helping collect and deliver the food that had to be stored in the homes of LINK volunteers until about 1997 when the food pantry in Herndon was built. “I felt the need was out there,” she said. “I like the feeling, the gratification, what it is to help people who need the help. I guess you can appreciate the gift of life more knowing you’re able to help others.”
Each year, Roberta’s volunteer workload increased during the holidays. She sent letters to 60 public and private schools in two counties asking for support of the holiday food baskets given to needy families, and then arranged dates to pick up the food the schools collect. Later, she started answering the phone lines to help those seeking to receive the food baskets during the Holiday Basket programs. Community volunteer Ed Linek called Roberta "a gold mine in Sterling." " Her efforts with LINK and other organizations have helped many people in this community," said Linek, a Sterling resident. "She was a quiet lovable individual that did her charity work without a big fanfare.”
“We all team together to help each other out when we get these volunteer jobs … if we get overextended,” Bruckschen said. Roberta was an active member of the Ladies Auxiliary to the Veterans of Foreign Wars, where she served as treasurer and secretary for 13 years. She was also a member of the Sterling Raritan Club. She and her husband Mr. Hugh Bruckschen, a retired printer from the American Newspapers Association who also volunteers, have three children and four grandchildren. They were married 50 years.
I always considered Roberta to be one of the leaders in the LINK organization. She was a great mentor to people who were just beginning to volunteer. We had many phone conversations regarding how to better build community awareness of the LINK mission. She had a great deal of insight about the Sterling and Herndon indigent population. God bless Roberta Bruckschen. We will not soon forget her.
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