News from Northrop Grumman

CRAM Team Brightens Holiday (December 7, 2010)


Julie Lichay

Sixty men and women temporarily located in Huntsville Alabama, undergoing training as operators of the Counter Rocket Artillery and Mortar (C-RAM) systems for the Army and soon to deploy to Afghanistan, selflessly opened their hearts to nearly one hundred foster children in Alabama. Members of the C-RAM team, residing in a local hotel while attending pre-deployment training, noticed a new Christmas tree that had been put up in the lobby, fully decorated with paper ornaments from local Alabama foster children each wishing for just one simple Christmas gift. Members of the entire deployment group—quietly and unprompted—each proceeded to take several ornaments from the tree, secretly replacing them with gifts requested by the foster children. Not only did all of the team members generously buy multiple gifts to the one gift each child had requested, many of them even bought “big ticket” items ranging from video games, MP3 Players, X-Box Units, or a complete children’s wardrobe, with their own money.

Ms. Lee Marshall, founder of the Kids to Love Foundation, a 501(c)(3) foundation whose ultimate goal is to find “forever families” for children awaiting adoption, gratefully accepted the gifts on behalf of the foster children. Marshall, a former foster and adopted child, herself, began the foundation in 2004, and has made it her mission to advocate on behalf of foster children everywhere, to find them permanent, loving homes. Thanks to a group of sixty generous personnel who will soon deploy to a war zone, a large group of local foster children will have one of the happiest and most memorable Christmases ever. What will stay with the children long after their presents are forgotten, however, is the fact that a group of complete strangers with the Christmas spirit deeply rooted in their hearts, took the time to reach out to them with unconditional love and share their blessings with them by “adopting” them with kindness and generosity this Christmas.