Today’s blog is for everyone who’s been following the story about Bob Freese and Peggy Schaefer and their goodwill trip to Newfoundland.
It’s a thank-you trip where Bob and Peggy are handing out candy bars as a small token of appreciation for the kindness the residents there showed on 9/11. The story about how Newfoundlanders opened their homes to almost 7,000 stranded airplane passengers was made popular by the hit Broadway musical Come From Away.(Click here to read my most recent blog about the trip.)
They’re calling it their “Soul Connection Tour,” and it has begun.
Bob and Peggy embarked on their journey on July 23, with more than 1400 wrapped and personally signed candy bars carefully packed away in their RV. Six friends and four RVs are joining them on the tour, and even before reaching Newfoundland they’ve had daily adventures, visiting historical sites, museums and castles, and sampling a lot of great food and beers.
Peggy Schaefer (right) with a happy brewpub employeeTwo more candy bars handed out at the pub
It took them only a few days for Bob and Peggy to start distributing their candy bars, and it happened even before they reached the province. The first ones went to some fellas from Newfoundland they met at a historical site. The first ones the entire Soul Connection group handed out were at the Secret Cove Brewing Company in Port au Port, NL. Bob reports that “Yes, there were some tears! One family had their 10-year old boy come up to say thank you and shake hands as they left.”
Thank you to everyone who donated money or candy bars, and helped wrap and sign the candy bars. Your efforts are going a long way to help spread our country’s appreciation to the residents of Newfoundland.
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The Soul Connection Tour is just about ready to leave the station!
That would be the thank-you trip that Bob Freese and Peg Schaeffer are planning to take to Newfoundland later this month, to hand out candy bars a small token of appreciation for the kindness the residents there showed on 9/11. The story about how Newfoundlanders opened their homes to almost 7,000 stranded airplane passengers was made popular by the hit Broadway musical Come From Away.
This is the second time Bob and Peg have made the trip. On their first, back in 2019, they handed out 600 Hershey Bars to strangers they met along the way, each wrapped with a personally-signed thank-you message. (Click here to read the blog I wrote about that trip.)
This time, Bob and Peg want to hand out at least 1200 candy bars. That goal in itself shouldn’t be difficult — they’re going to meet a lot of people on their travels. But buying and preparing all those candy bars? That’s another matter.
Fortunately, they’ve been getting a lot of help. Last Thursday they hosted a “signing party” at the Webster Chamber of Commerce office, and 15 folks showed up to sign and wrap. Most everybody came with an armload of candy bars to donate to the cause. By the end of the afternoon, 550 candy bars were ready to go. The wrappers, by the way, had been signed by people from more than a dozen states.
At the signing partyCandy bars ready to goBob and Peg’s “ugly sticks” ready for the trip
But the kindness of the Webster community is reaching well beyond that signing party. For example, Denise Baller and her Dancing With Denise dancers and parents are donating, signing and wrapping 500 candy bars on their own, and the staff at Webster Comfort Care have prepared another 180.
Like on their last trip, Bob and Peg will be distributing the candy bars across the country as they travel from town to town. They’re especially looking forward to attending a performance of Come From Away when they’re in Gander, where they hope to be allowed to present candy bars to all the actors and audience members.
Another highlight of the trip will be a potluck supper they’re hosting while in Gander. They’re inviting the whole town, and all of the “real” people whose stories are depicted in the play. It’s their way of celebrating the “soul connection” the world has with Newfoundlanders.
Just a reminder today that your opportunity to help share some love and appreciation with the people of Newfoundland is fast approaching.
You may remember my blog about Bob Freese and Peg Schaefer, two Webster folks who are planning a trip to Newfoundland to hand out candy bars to the residents there as a small token of appreciation for the kindness they showed on 9/11. The story about how, for five days, Newfoundlanders opened their homes to almost 7,000 stranded airplane passengers was made popular by the hit Broadway musical Come From Away.
This is the second time Bob and Peg have made the trip. On their first, back in 2019, they covered almost 5,000 miles up one side of Newfoundland and down the other, handing out 600 candy bars (Hershey Bars, specifically) to strangers they met along the way. Each candy bar had a thank-you message wrapped around it, signed by a grateful American (mostly Webster-ites).
The very first “wrapping party”600 candy bars readied for the 2019 trip
Later this month, Bob and Peg will be returning to Newfoundland to hand out even more candy bars and reconnect with many of the new friends they made there.
You can help them share the love. On Thursday July 6 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., Bob and Peg will be at the Webster Chamber of Commerce office, 1110 Crosspointe Lane (Suite C) for a candy-bar-wrapping-and-signing party. It’s a chance to add your personal thanks to the good people of Newfoundland. It would be great if you could bring some candy bars with you (1.55-ounce Hershey Bars). But even if you don’t, please consider stopping by and joining the signing fun. Bring the kids, too!
If you’re a fan of the hit Broadway show Come From Away (or even if you’re not), the following story about kindness will warm your heart.
Come From Away tells how 38 planes were diverted to Gander, Newfoundland on 9/11 and how the people of Gander and nearby towns opened their hearts and their homes for five days to house and feed the almost 7,000 stranded passengers and crew members. My story today is about how two Webster residents, Bob Freese and Peg Schaefer, took it upon themselves to thank the people of Newfoundland for their generosity, and how they’re planning to do it again later this summer. It tells of a month-long trip spanning almost 5,000 miles that would take them to the four corners of the island, and change their lives forever.
In December of 2018, when they were visiting friends near New York City, Bob and Peg saw Come From Away for the first time. It touched them deeply. They realized soon afterwards that they wanted to visit Newfoundland, meet the people, and express their gratitude.
They planned their trip for the following August, and as they were doing so, they wondered how exactly to express their gratitude. Ultimately, they decided on chocolate. More specifically, 1.55-ounce Hershey Bars, which could be easily purchased and wrapped with their message of thanks.
They started spreading the word about their planned adventure, and donations of candy bars and money to purchase candy bars started flowing in. Shortly before their trip, they invited friends and family members to a cabin party to wrap the candy bars and individually sign each thank you message. By the time they were all done, Bob and Peg had 600 Hershey Bars prepped for their trip to Newfoundland.
The signing party held before the 2019 trip.600 candy bars ready to go
On August 15, 2019, Bob and Peg packed the candy bars into their RV and set off for Newfoundland. It took almost a week to reach the ferry in North Sydney, Nova Scotia, and another six and a half hours on the ferry to Port aux Basques, Newfoundland. So they had plenty of time to figure out exactly how they’d go about handing out the chocolate. How would they approach people? Would it seem weird just to walk up to someone and give them a candy bar?
Turns out, they needn’t have been concerned; it just came naturally. In no time at all they’d handed out their very first chocolate thank you message, to a waitress in Port aux Basques.
For the next several weeks, Bob and Peg traveled from town to town, up one side of the island and down the other, distributing their candy bars to people they met in shops, stores, visitors’ centers, gas stations, or even people on the street they saw walking by. Each time they’d explain how they were so inspired by the Come From Away story that they wanted to visit Newfoundland and thank the residents. And each time they’d get smiles, hugs, tears, and thanks in return.
“They were blown away,” Bob said, “like we gave them a million dollars.”
Now, that’s a pretty cool story in its own right. Two kind people taking the time and significant effort to return the love shown by the Newfoundlanders during one of the darkest times in our country’s history. But as I listened to Bob and Peg tell their story, I realized that the most amazing part of their adventure is not the kindness they showed, but the kindnesses they received. Everywhere they went, they experienced the kind of generosity and genuine kindness towards strangers that was epitomized in Come From Away.
They actually got a taste of that hospitality well before they embarked on their trip. Several months earlier, they were vacationing in Florida when they met a couple from Newfoundland who happen to live about a half hour north of the ferry (and “there’s only one road”). When they heard about Bob and Peg’s plans, they asked, would they like to park their RV in the driveway when they got to town?
They accepted the offer, of course, but “We didn’t want to impose,” Peg said. “We thought one night in the driveway and then we’d be on our way.” But their new friends had other ideas, showing them around the town, and sharing their meals for two days.
That was their first experience with Newfoundlanders’ hospitality. There would be many others.
Like the day they met Joyce and Mabel, two ladies who were walking by their RV. After Bob and Peg presented them with candy bars, they happened to mention they hoped to see a moose on their trip. Later that evening a man pulled up to the RV and said, “Hi, I’m Pierce, Joyce’s husband. She said you want to go see some moose. Get in, I’ll take you moose lookin’.” And they did.
Or the day they handed out some candy bars to several men gathered at a town’s clean water spring. “Meet us here in the parking lot tomorrow,” they said, “and we’ll take you whale watching.” And they did. Later, they invited Bob and Peg to dinner.
Incidents like those happened pretty much everywhere they went, as people opened their hearts and their homes to the strangers from New York who were traveling around, handing out candy bars.
But then it got even better.
Towards the end of their trip, they were on Fogo Island when they met Diane Davis, a third-grade teacher from Gander Academy, on whom the character of Beulah Davis was partly based.
“All of a sudden she pulled up,” Peg said. “She has a Come From Away jacket, Come From Away shoes. She said, ‘I’ve been following you. I’ve been seeing your candy bar posted on my Facebook page and it was getting closer and closer, and I was hoping you would come here.’ She came into our camper for two hours and told us her story.”
A few days later, they were in Gander and got a note from Diane, saying that a “few of us” were getting together at a local restaurant that evening and would they like to come along?
“When we got there,” Peg said, “we saw 14, 16 people already there. Almost everybody that’s in the play, the people are there. Along with Michael Rubinoff, the creative producer.” The date was Sept. 10, and everyone was in town to attend a remembrance ceremony the next day in Appleton.
After dinner, Rubinoff sat with Bob and Peg for two hours, telling them the entire story of how the production came to be, start to finish.
Of course Bob and Peg were invited to the ceremony the next day in Appleton, where they were special guests with front-row seats, and their story was part of the speakers’ remarks. That afternoon, they attended a second ceremony in Gander, where Peg stood next to the real-life Beulah.
What a perfect way to cap an amazing experience.
Bob and Peg had a hard time putting into words what the trip meant to them. “Our mission was to say thanks, and it changed our lives,” Bob said. “One of the things that we found out is the message from the play is all true,” he added. “They’re unpretentious, fun-loving people who are giving and sharing and helping each other.”
It was such a life-changing experience that they’ll be repeating it later this summer. In late July, Bob and Peg will be returning to Newfoundland to hand out even more candy bars and reconnect with many of the new friends they made there. (“They say that when you meet a Newfoundlander, you’re a friend for life,” Peg said.) They’re calling this trip the “Soul Connection Tour,” and they’ll be traveling with seven other people this time. The candy bars will have a new message. In 2019 the wrappers said thank you from the people of Upstate New York. This time they’re from the people of the United States of America.
By the way, they never saw a moose up close. Perhaps they will this time, especially if the amazing folks of Newfoundland have any say in it.
With Michael Rubinoff in front of a piece of the World Trade CenterBob and Peg at the overlook in Dover where Nick and Diane stood in the playUgly sticks!
How you can help
If you’d like to support Bob and Peg on their 2023 Soul Connection Tour this summer, there are a few ways you can help:
Log onto their GoFundMe page to donate some money to the cause. You can read more about their mission there as well.
Or better yet, buy a box of candy bars and join Bob and Peg on Thursday July 6 from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Webster Chamber of Commerce, 1110 Crosspointe Lane (Suite C) for a candy-bar-wrapping-and-signing party. It’s a chance to add your personal thanks to the good people of Newfoundland. You don’t even need to bring any candy bars. Just come and join the fun. Bring the kids, watch some videos taken during the previous trip, and sign some candy bars.
If you’d like to arrange another time to sign some bars, contact Bob Freese at BobFreese@gmail.com. Click here to see the Soul Connection Tour flyer for more details and a look at the thank-you message.
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