The folks at McHale's ChopHouse want to help one of their own, a server who's stationed overseas, and his platoon.
By JANET ZINK
Published April 4, 2003
Tom McHale wanted to celebrate the second anniversary of the opening of his restaurant, McHale's ChopHouse, last week, but with the war raging in Iraq, the timing just didn't seem right.
So he folded the occasion into an opportunity to collect personal care items for McHale's server Cpl. David Hixon, 21, who is stationed in Kuwait with the U.S. Marines.
Hixon, who has worked at McHale's since it opened two years ago on State Road 60, was shipped overseas in January. He recently sent a letter to a favorite customer who shared it with Hixon's co-workers at the Brandon Boulevard restaurant. In it, he expressed a need for such items as baby wipes, sunscreen and toilet paper.
So McHale, a former Tampa Bay Buccaneer, put red-white-and-blue fliers on all the restaurant tables and announced on the roadside marquis that they were collecting personal care products for American troops.
McHale's collected items during the restaurant's monthly live music night Saturday and during an afternoon anniversary celebration Tuesday.
"We had a great day," McHale says. "We collected one Chevrolet Tahoe full of goods and quite a bit more after that. There's a good truckload full of stuff."
He will send the care package to Hixon's entire platoon.
"It's nice to support them and show that we care about them," McHale says.
