Magic Johnson hosts food drive for hundreds of Detroit families: 'Good to be home'

It’s a frigid morning, the first after a week of welcomed warmth, and NBA legend Earvin “Magic” Johnson is loading turkeys and toys into car trunks at a Detroit church. 

Hundreds of cars lined the parking lot of Second Ebenezer Church on Saturday morning, waiting to be loaded up with nearly 50 pounds of goods including nonperishable foods, personal care items, children’s books, turkeys and hams. The giveaway, hosted by General Motors and Johnson, is part of Johnson’s Holiday Hope program, now in its eighth year. 

A starstruck female driver parks her car at the head of the line, the trunk open and ready to be loaded up by Johnson, and rolls down her window, “You’re here!” 

“I told y'all I’d be here, baby,” responds Johnson, who hails from Lansing. 

For two hours, the parking lot falls into a rhythm of volunteers calling out for items, the sounds of trunks slamming shut, and folks saying, “God bless you.” Drivers look at Johnson in awe and disbelief as he waves them along the assembly line and touches the same car seats and handles they touch on a daily basis. 

“Everybody should be able to enjoy the holidays, to be able to feed their families and sometimes because it is tough, we want to step in and make sure that they can have a good Thanksgiving and hopefully as well as Christmas,” Johnson said. “A lot of times it's not even their fault that they're hurting, so we just want to make sure that we bless families at this time of need. And my heart feels so good to be home.”

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Need is especially dire this year, said Bishop Edgar Vann of Second Ebenezer Church, as families are struggling to stay afloat amid increasing food costs and stagnant wages. The Second Ebenezer Church facilitated the distribution of vouchers for Saturday’s drive that helped organizers prepare for the flood of responses. 

“Inflation is at unprecedented levels, families are hurting, things are unstable,” Vann said. “People don't know what's going to happen next for many of them. And so families are often left in an area sort of in the lurch a bit, and so we think we're filling in a very important and significant gap.”

Inflation concerns were critical in the recent election season — with gas and grocery bills soaring — and now heading into the holiday season, families are feeling strained. Johnson said he hopes the volume of Saturday’s distribution will last families into Thanksgiving and through Christmas. 

Michelee Taylor, 62, of Detroit, a guardian to five of her grandchildren, was in tears after pulling away from the distribution assembly line. After her daughter’s death, she’s done everything within her power to keep her grandchildren from becoming wards of the state and give them a stable household. 

“I’m doing the best I can. I greatly appreciate it,” she said. “It’s just beautiful, people getting together and doing stuff for people like me. I can put the sadness behind me.” 

She said she told her teenage grandson to wait for her at the door and was excited to show them what she got.

“All I want them (her grandchildren) to do is be happy, just be happy,” she said. “We’ll make do with what we got.”

Contact Miriam Marini: mmarini@freepress.com.