Helping those in need: Local businessman donates shoes, backpacks to students
Jul. 30—RUSSELL — It has been said that in order to truly understand another person's life we should "walk a mile in their shoes."
Diamond Lewis, owner of Sideburns Stadium Cuts in Russell, has taken this adage one better. On Friday, he donated 300 pairs of shoes and 300 backpacks to area school children who might not otherwise have had those necessities.
Lewis said that this year marks his 10th anniversary of being in business at Sideburns, and his seventh year in business at Bintopia. Each year he and his team have done things to help children as they start the new school year, typically in the form of offering free haircuts.
"But this year, with all the difficulties from COVID, we decided that we needed to do more. So this year we wanted to do something that lasted a little longer than a haircut, and we decided on shoes and backpacks," Lewis said.
Beginning back in March, Lewis and his team began working on the donation of shoes and backpacks in their Russell location, and a donation of 200 backpacks and pairs of shoes in their Teays Valley, West Virginia, location. Locally, representatives from six school districts picked up the donation in Russell, and will dispense them equally between male and female students.
Representative from one district, Jodie and Jason Hunt of Backpack Buddies in Ironton, said that Lewis' donation is a huge help to those in need in the area. Backpack Buddies is a non-profit organization that regularly provides necessities such as food for school children to take home on the weekends, and a back to school clothing giveaway.
"This is a tremendous blessing to us, and a lot of kids in our county," Jodie Hunt said.
Lewis said that it was due to the support of his family, his team at Sideburns and Bintopia, the public giving him their business, and the organizations he said are out in the community fighting for school children every day, that his donation was possible.
"It takes all of those people doing all of the work, all the way down the line, to make something like this happen," Lewis said. "It is tough enough for children who start school who don't have the same house and the same car or other advantages as all the other kids. Starting school without a good clothes and backpacks make it much worse."
Lewis said the total cost of the donation was around $9,000, and he was glad to return something for all of the business the community has blessed him with.
Lewis said he was grateful to all of the organizations who picked up the donations, who will in turn go out into the community and make sure those who are the most in need receive help.
"If we all work together," Lewis said, "we can make sure that no one has to do without the basics they need."
