The methods have changed, but the mission of the American Red Cross remains the same. The organization celebrated its 140th anniversary May 21.
“The American Red Cross prevents and alleviates human suffering in the face of emergencies by mobilizing the power of volunteers and the generosity of donors,” said Susan Landreth-Everitt, the executive director of American Red Cross of East Central Georgia in Augusta, who has the mission committed to heart.
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Founded by nurse Clara Barton during the Civil War, one of its top missions is to military service members and their families.
“Barton served on the battlefield during the Civil War and saw the soldiers who were not able to get communications to their families,” she said.
Since Sept. 11, 2001, the American Red Cross has provided services to more than one million military families, according to the organization’s website.
The Red Cross has multiple service member programs, including getting emergency messages through to them.
Landreth-Everitt said she often hears stories of those who the Red Cross alerted and helped arrange for them to get home for the birth of a child or the death of a parent.
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Red Cross volunteers serve in VA hospitals. The organization has programs to help families readjust when a service member comes home from a deployment and provides in-person support to active duty personnel.
Landreth-Everitt said volunteers are the backbone of the organization.
“We only have three paid staff, so we rely on an army of volunteers to get the job done,” Landreth-Everitt said of the local chapter, which serves more than 20 Georgia counties. Its offices are located in Augusta on Ellis Street.
Locally, volunteers serve upwards of 40,000 hours a year.
Oftentimes, people think of the Red Cross when a disaster hits.
Landreth-Everitt said she got her first up-close look at what the Red Cross does after she lost her home in Hurricane Floyd in 1999. She was living near Myrtle Beach, S.C. at the time. The hurricane wasn’t the problem, she said, it was the flooding that occurred as the storm lingered and dumped upwards of 20 inches of rain on the coast.
“My house was under 18 feet of water,” she said.
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The people who helped her family during that time were volunteers from the Red Cross.
“I thought ‘who are these people who are willing to help complete strangers?’” she said.
While many people want to help during a disaster, that’s not the time to sign up, she said. The Red Cross has lots of training for its volunteer teams. During a crisis, the volunteers have to focus on helping people, not training people.
The third area the Red Cross is known for is its blood support programs.
The bloodmobile hasn’t been running because of the pandemic. It’s not safe to cram people into that small space during the pandemic, she said. Blood drives have been held in larger spaces such as the Sacred Heart Cultural Center’s great hall.
“The Red Cross supplies 40% of the nation’s blood,” she said. “We’re the largest blood supplier. Most of it stays here. We first support local hospitals.”
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Landreth-Everitt said the organization has an app that tracks a blood donation from the donor to the place where it is used.
To learn more about the Red Cross, visit redcross.org.
Charmain Z. Brackett is the Features Editor for The Augusta Press. Reach her at charmain@theaugustapress.com.
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