By Glenn Rolfe

GEORGETOWN — It’s said that the early bird gets the worm.

But the first visitors to Sandhill Fields on Tuesday also got a bird — a Mountaire roaster — along with fixings, just in time for a Thanksgiving feast.

Elected local and state officials, churchgoers and other volunteers teamed with Love INC and Mountaire Farms to distribute 252 food boxes.

The distribution was completed by 11 a.m., the time it was scheduled to start, according to Georgetown Mayor Bill West.

“We weren’t supposed to start until 11 a.m., but we had 30 to 40 cars lined up at 9 o’clock. So we decided to start. I called to see if we could start early,” he said.

The mayor reported plenty of happiness on the windy, brisk day.

“We saw a lot of smiling faces. I’m pretty sure we made a lot of families happy, being able to put something on the table.”

Some 10,000 boxes were packed the day before, during Mountaire Farms’ annual Thanksgiving for Thousands event at its Selbyville warehouse facility.

Crossroad Community Church, near Georgetown, was the main distribution hub, with other churches — Gateway Fellowship in Bridgeville, Laurel Wesleyan, UNITED Church in Milford and St. John’s United Methodist in Seaford — participating in pickup and delivery.

Each box contained a Mountaire roaster chicken, corn, green beans, stuffing, gravy, cranberries and brownies for a family of four.

Mayor West said he specifically requested that a Mountaire refrigerated trailer be stationed for distribution at Sandhill Fields, the venue for an ongoing outdoor church service.

“I put it out as a message to the people attending the church service, that we wanted to do this. It has been a great success,” he said. “I asked them to help me, and they came out here and helped me today. This is great for the community. This is helping the community put food on the table.

“We’ve taken people that didn’t feel comfortable going into their churches. They are able to come here on Sunday and listen to a message through the radio in their vehicle,” Mayor West added. “We’ve done it since COVID started. We started out with probably 60 cars. We’re down to 30, but those 30 are here consistently. We have even got people that are coming down here from Milford, people coming from the beach and people coming from Seaford. It’s a mix of different people coming here to do this. It’s great.”