Toys for Tots D4LAR

Defense Logistics Agency

Story by Dianne Ryder

Date: 12.20.2010

FORT BELVIOR, Va. -- Many holiday tales feature children anticipating a visit from a certain man of goodwill traveling through snow to deliver toys. In a similar scenario, Dec. 17, Defense Logistics Agency employees at the McNamara Headquarters Complex anxiously awaited the arrival of the U.S. Marine Corps members who would deliver toys to local children.

Although the previous day’s snow delayed their trip, officers from Marine Corps Base Quantico, Va., arrived to pick up 800 toys for delivery to disadvantaged children in the Washington, D.C., metro area as part of the annual Toys for Tots campaign.

Toys for Tots began in 1947, when U.S. Marine Corps Reservist Maj. Bill Hendricks and other members of the Marine Corps Reserves collected and distributed 5,000 toys to needy children.

As part DLA Logistics Operations Marine Corps Team, Customer Account Action Officer Scotty Cobb was the primary coordinator for this year’s enterprisewide toy collection in the McNamara Headquarters Complex.

“Each year … Toys for Tots kicks off its yearly program with the primary goal [of helping] less fortunate children throughout the United States by delivering a new toy at Christmas,” Cobb said. “The ultimate goal is for each child to receive two toys.”

He said the entire Marine Corps Team organized and conducted the Toys for Tots campaign, but Mike Brletich, the team’s deputy, insisted all the accolades go to Cobb.

“Scotty deserves all the credit. … He did all the legwork,” Brletich said. “We just oversaw the process and helped out where we could. … He spearheaded the whole effort.”

Cobb formally presented the toys to Marine Staff Sgt. Manuel Gonzales and Marine Sgt. Jeremy Olson, both from Company D, 4th Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, in Quantico.

“This campaign symbolizes a message of hope to less fortunate children that will assist them in becoming responsible, productive, patriotic citizens,” Cobb said.

Gonzales then presented Cobb with a commander’s award certificate for DLA, signed by Marine Corps Lt. Gen. John F. Kelly, commander of Marine Corps Forces Reserve.

Both Gonzales and Olson agreed that sponsoring Toys for Tots for the Northern Virginia region is a worthwhile endeavor.

“We try to contribute to the area by collecting toys for [children in] Alexandria, Fairfax, Fredericksburg, Stafford and Fauquier [areas],” Gonzales said. “When it comes to this time of year, that’s all we do is Toys for Tots.”

“It’s important to make an outreach to the kids who are less fortunate on a holiday that the rest of us take for granted,” Olson said. “Obviously, during times like these, everybody deserves to have a happy holiday, so what we try to provide [them] with such a time.”