8/20/2004 - Former Inmate and Founder of Prison Fellowship’s Angel Tree®

Mary Kay Beard

Former Inmate and Founder of
Prison Fellowship's Angel Tree®

In 1982, Angel Tree® debuted in Birmingham, Ala., when Mary Kay Beard, an ex-prisoner, received permission to erect Christmas trees in shopping malls to recruit shoppers to purchase presents for prisoners' children. Beard, who served part of a 22-year sentence for burglary, grand larceny, and robbery, said she spent six Christmases in state prison watching women gather soap, shampoo, and toothpaste they received from charity groups to wrap and give to their kids as gifts. "I realized that children don't care as much about things as they do about being loved," Beard said.

And on visiting day at the prison, instead of the kids turning up their noses at such simple gifts, "there was such joy on their faces," Mary Kay remembers. "It didn't really matter to them what they got; it was from Mama!"

Mary Kay Beard got out of prison in 1976 and joined Prison Fellowship in 1981 as the area director of Alabama. Mary Kay began Alabama Angel Tree-to provide gifts to prisoners' children on behalf of the incarcerated parents. From the two trees set up in shopping malls, busy shoppers selected a tree ornament bearing the name of a prisoner's child and then bought that child a gift. In Angel Tree's first year, Prison Fellowship volunteers distributed Christmas presents to 556 Alabama children.

Since then, the Angel Tree program has reached some 6.3 million children and has spread across the country as local church volunteers provide gifts to children of inmates in their communities. These local volunteers are often able to provide much needed assistance to these children and their families. During Christmas 2003, 14,000 churches across the country delivered gifts to 525,000 children of prisoners through Prison Fellowship's Angel Tree.

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