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TOOELE — What started off as one resident wanting to gift money to someone in need has turned into hundreds of community members donating Christmas gifts to one another.
It is a new tradition called the Tooele Giving Train, and it is getting a lot of buzz around town.
"It is absolutely amazing and brings me to tears every time," Patty Daley said. She helped set up the movement on the Tooele County 411 Facebook page last week.
"It all started with someone in the group wanting to give away his birthday money to someone in need," Daley said. "He wanted people on the Facebook page to nominate someone to give it to."
That post sparked an idea. Last Friday, Daley asked others to donate items or services to members of the community.
"Hundreds of people have been posting on the page. Some people are giving away crafts. We have a local pet store here in town that he decided to include the fur babies," she said. "And some of it is from people who literally have nothing."
Tooele resident Julia Dyches read the post and was prompted to get involved.
"I thought: I don't really have any money to donate, but maybe I can donate some time," Dyches said. "So I decided to try and see if anybody would be interested in a set of stockings and, yeah, it just went crazy."
Dyches post received 500 comments with names of nominees. She said she would choose the recipient at random.
"I just think it's so neat to see so many people giving to others," she said.
Project organizers said even though this was a Christmas activity, they have no end date and no plans of slowing down.
