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Roxana VFC hosts final chicken dinner of 2006
By Laura Ford
Staff Reporter
The Roxana Volunteer Fire Company hosted its final chicken dinner of the season Saturday night. Do not let the words dinner and night fool you, however. Volunteers were working long before the tickets went on sale at 4 p.m.
“It’s a two-day process to do a four-hour dinner,” said Todd Marvel, secretary of the fire department.
Before the rooster crowed Saturday morning, Bonnie Johnson and Mary Jane Wharton headed to the kitchen and began the preparation for that evening’s event. Stirring the homemade gravy, they said they always get an early start to the day of the chicken dinners.
Others arrived to move the fire trucks and vehicles out of the garage to make room for the anticipated crowd. “Sometimes we get as many as 1,200 people,” claimed Marvel.
Saturday’s dinner was the last of four chicken dinners the fire hall hosts annually every June, July, August and September. Eager for what was to come that evening Roxana Fire Chief Andy Johnson said, “Yeah, it’s quiet now. But once it starts running, I can hardly keep up.”
Fast forward to 5 p.m. The fowl smell of chicken was in the air, and the fire hall was hopping. The kitchen was full of volunteers making sure the buffet stayed stocked with green beans, coleslaw, mashed potatoes, gravy and rolls. The chicken, which just hours prior had been stacked tightly in boxes in the walk-in refrigerator, was now going through the assembly line. Four fireman were busy breading the meat, while two others proved they were not chicken and manned the five-basket fryer.
Amidst the chaos the “breaders” kept a close watch to ensure no one stepped too close to the potentially dangerous fryers. They were also sure to “flour” them if and when somebody did. Andy Johnson, who took the role as fry-man, said, “Fun is the name of the game back here.”
Outside in the dining hall it was a much different scene. “Leg, wing or breast?” asked Jennifer Wyckoff, RVFC Ladies Auxiliary member, as the customers filed through the buffet. She said the hustle and bustle of the day pays off. “It’s a long days worth of work, but we make out good.”
Chelsea Betts, a 15-year-old member of the Starlites Twirlers, was among another group that helped with and also benefited from the fundraiser. She, with her fellow teammates, helped clear tables and kept people flowing in and out. Betts said she was surprised how many were in attendance. “As soon as we clear the tables they come in,” she said.
Still others sat in semicircles outside the hall, talking and waiting for their numbers to be called. Steve Zane said he and his wife, Rachel, have come to the Roxana chicken dinners every year since 1990. “It’s good chicken, a good price and I like to eat,” said Zane.
Fink said he and his friends get together every time they can make a chicken dinner. Fink’s friend Bill Jarney even claimed, “Heck, this is the only chicken I eat!”
So what is it about this chicken that can make a non-biddy-eater like Jarney surrender to its savories? Well, it is a homemade recipe passed down from the old days of the fire hall chicken dinners beginning in the late ’60’s. This original recipe is one that cannot be given out and, as Ronna Cobb, vice president of the Ladies Auxiliary, laid out, “If I tell you, I have to kill you.”
Though the recipe for the fried fowl has not changed throughout the years, many other things about the fundraiser have. Charter member Gerald Pepper recalled the early days, when they used to go around and ask the community to donate a bag of potatoes, a hen and/or cabbage in order to make the dinners possible. “But as we grew, it grew,” he said.
And grown it has. At 10 crates of potatoes, 72 gallons of green beans and 1,318 pounds of chicken, there is no way community donations would support the popularity of today’s dinners. Now Cobb makes sure the food is ordered well before the day of the event, according to the numbers of customers from the year before.
But there is never assurance there will be the same outcome as previous years. “There are no two chicken dinners that are the same,” said Marvel.
Not all of the surprises have been positive ones. In the past there have been problems like losing electricity, running out of food or problems with the weather. Quick thinking led to emergency trips to Hocker’s Supermarket or donated fans to relieve any real disasters. Notably, though, there has never been a fire at the chicken dinner — something for which they would be beyond prepared to handle.
This September’s chicken dinner went smoothly according to Cobb. With about 900 guests served, there was still fried chicken left over to donate to the High Tide church congregation, who also volunteered to help staff the event.
Customers left the dinner full and satisfied. They knew they not only had gotten a good meal, but also donated to a worthy cause. Some were even so content as 7-year-old Jordan Smith, who said to his grandmother as he left that evening, “Let’s live at the chicken dinner and only come home to have breakfast.”
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