Cracker Barrel helps troops with their dirty laundry

[thedrifter]

June 13, 2003

Cracker Barrel helps troops with their dirty laundry

By Vickie Chachere
Associated Press


TAMPA, Fla. ? In the dirt and grime of the Iraqi desert, Army Reserve Lt. Dominick Filipponi and the men in the transportation unit he commands can sometimes go for a week without a change of clothes and a shower.
So when the 29-year-old soldier had a chance to ask his parents for a favor, it seemed a simple enough request: send a washboard to help the unit do its laundry. But in a world of automatic washers and dryers, washboards have been relegated to the world of kitschy country decor and the occasional washboard band.

Joan Filipponi and her husband, also named Dominick, searched online stores and auctions from their Pasco County home. They also called department stores and hardware stores and couldn?t find a single one of the galvanized steel boards of days gone by.

It took a call to Cracker Barrel, the roadside restaurant which bills itself as the ?little old country store? to resolve the dirty laundry dilemma. Years ago, Cracker Barrels across the country sold washboards in their gift shops, but the boards had long ago been relegated to the clearance bin.

The company searched its 477 stores, finding five boards, which ? along with three washtubs and an assortment of games ? were sent to Iraq in a care package from the Cracker Barrel restaurant northeast of Tampa, for the lieutenant and his troops.

?He said it?s so difficult to stay clean,? said the soldier?s father, Dominick Filipponi, a retired New York City police detective. ?[The dust] is very fine. It?s like talcum powder. It sticks to them. He just wishes for those things we take for granted.?

Mark Carper, a former Marine who is now the manager of the generous Cracker Barrel, said employees tucked in a note thanking the troops for their work. They also put in checker boards, candy and bath soap in the packages.

?I know exactly what it?s like,? said Carper, who was a helicopter crew chief in the 1970s and ?80s. ?All you want is a shower and some clean clothes.?

As it turns out, the old-fashioned house ware has become a hot commodity in the desert. The Columbus Washboard Company, the Ohio factory that is the last remaining manufacturer of washboards in the U.S., has sent nearly 1,500 to the troops.

The boards are accompanied by boxes of laundry soap, clothes pins, clothes lines and small tubs. The company specially designed some boards to read ?Proud to be an American.?

?They are thrilled,? said Jacqui Barnett, the company?s co-owner. ?We are getting more requests.?

Barnett said she doubts the washboards will make the troops abandon modern conveniences when they return ? ?Have you washed on a washboard?? she asked ? but the company does a brisk overseas business in countries where washboards are still standard for getting clothes clean.

?We are hoping they leave them all over Baghdad and we get orders from over there,? she said.

Barnett said she received one note from a World War II veteran who fondly remembered the board he toted during the war. There was also a sad note from a Vietnam veteran, who told her he wore his uniform until it rotted away because he wasn?t able to wash it, she said.

Dominick Filipponi said he hopes his son will know what to do with the board once he gets it. His 16-truck unit supports the 101st Airborne Division, delivering supplies, fuel and mail.

?I?m not sure he knows how to do the laundry, but I?m sure he?s going to learn very fast,? he said. ?He was one of those kids who said, ?Here mom, here?s the laundry.? ?




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Copyright 2003 The Associated Press.


Sempers,

Roger