First Lady Breaks Bread With Homeless Children

In her initial outing as First Lady, Barbara Bush visited a tattered section of Washington Tuesday to make salami and cheese sandwiches and to read a story for 35 children at a charity facility that helps the homeless.

Wearing a red apron and up to her elbows in wheat bread, Mrs. Bush said that she chose the facility, called Martha’s Table, for her first excursion “because I’m hoping Americans will look at the range of volunteerism and see how important it is, what an important job they do.”

Asked if there is enough volunteerism to offset government cutbacks in aid to the poor, Mrs. Bush quickly replied: “No, there’s not enough volunteerism. You can forget the government cutbacks. The more volunteers we have the better off we’ll be.”

After washing her hands, Mrs. Bush slapped together a few of the 1,700 sandwiches that are delivered daily by the facility’s mobile soup kitchen to 700 homeless people in Washington. All of the food is donated by local merchants. The facility, which Mrs. Bush had visited in 1987, also has a children’s center that provides after-school meals, tutoring and playtime for 50 homeless or poor youngsters ages 2 to 14.

Some of the children had a pretty good idea what Tuesday’s event was about. The visitor was “Mrs. Washington,” one little boy declared proudly.

A grandmother of 10, Mrs. Bush walked in the door and took command of the children, saying: “Everybody quiet! Everybody sit down, please.” She sat in a wooden rocker with children gathered around her and proceeded to read them a book she had brought with her, entitled “How Fletcher Was Hatched,” a story of a dog that, by an unusual turn of circumstances, was encased in an egg.

Mrs. Bush was summarizing and paraphrasing in an animated tone as she went along. “This is the longest book,” she sighed.

She quizzed the children afterwards about the details of the story and asked them to howl like dogs. They did. She asked if anyone had a dog. “No!” they said in unison.

“You want to know our names?” one child asked.

“Yes, I want to know your names!” Mrs. Bush replied, and then listened as they introduced themselves. They clapped for her and then dashed for the cookies she had brought them from the White House.

Mrs. Bush told a reporter that it was not her intention to convey the message that she will be focusing on homelessness above other social issues.

“Anybody who needs help and I can help, then I’ll try to help,” she said.