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"From the deepest recesses of my heart, I thank Goodwill Industries for helping to light my candle." Jean Knepper

Miss Knepper, a polio victim who is the bookkeeper for the Akron, Ohio Goodwill Industries, was selected from among Goodwill Workers in the 119 Goodwill Industries as the one with the outstanding accomplishment over a handicap during 1956.

The Service Of Goodwill Industries Speaks for Itself

In the process of helping 28,000 handicapped men and women to help themselves during 1956, 119 Goodwill Industries were helping people, their communities and their country.

Underlying the facts and figures of jobs, training, wages and personal assistance were the human dramas of lives being transformed from inactivity to activity, from despair to achievement and from defeat to victory.

Goodwill Industries services to humanity -- the fulcrum upon which all other accomplishments rested -- is best told by the handicapped people themselves. The words of Jean Knepper, National Goodwill Worker of 1956, which appear on the preceeding page, tell of one person's feelings.

Such testimony could be repeated thousands of times -- from Maine to Oregon and from California to Florida.

From San Jose, California comes the story of Brenda, who applied to Goodwill Industries with a nerve disability. "It was the most important day of my life," she recalls. "I was scared and lonely. Then I found that many other persons had handicaps, some of them far worse than mine, and I no longer felt alone."

A man with a heart condition who works in the Charleston, West Virginia Goodwill Industries store says, "It's important for a person like me to know he can still do things."

In Dallas, Texas, a woman whose back was broken in 1949, repairs dolls at Goodwill Industries. "I love my job," she declares. "I'd rather have my job than anybody's."

"I'm another example of why Goodwill is known throughout the world for aid to the handicapped," says a man in El Paso, Texas, who has a Goodwill Industries job despite being paralyzed from the hips down as a result of a railroad accident.

A 65-year-old widow with arms pain-wrenched by arthritis sews upholstery for the Detroit Goodwill Industries and describes herself as the "luckiest person in the world."

Crippled by a spine malady, a girl in Birmingham, Alabama smiles as she does her Goodwill Industries work. "I love this job," she says, "and I'll never get over being grateful for it."

These and many other people working in Goodwill Industries earned $15,500,000 in opportunity wages in 1956. They paid at least $1,700,000 in social security and income taxes. They produced repaired goods worth $19,000,000 when sold in Goodwill stores.

Besides helping handicapped people through training and employment, Goodwill Industries in most cities offered such services as personnel counseling, medical assistance, vocational guidance, work adjustment, low-cost cafeteria meals and recreation. The Goodwill Industries service also included the traditional features of religious inspiration through voluntary chapel programs.

Depending upon community needs and financial resources available, Goodwill Industries also were increasingly developing programs of psychological testing, work evaluation, occupational therapy and physical therapy to enable handicapped people to achieve full and useful lives.

HOW THE GOODWILL INDUSTRIES PROGRAM WORKS

Usable clothing and household articles are contributed from homes in the communities and surrounding areas where a Goodwill Industries is located. These articles first are sorted, with unrepairable items sold as salvage. Repairable articles are sent to workshops, where handicapped people recondition them. After reconditioning, the items are sold in Goodwill stores. Many Goodwill Industries also employ handicapped people on sorting, assembling, packaging, repairing and other jobs contracted with business firms. The four major operations in Goodwill Industries -- collection, repair, sale, and contract work -- are shown below.

Operations of Goodwill Industries Tell of Great Potential

Goodwill Industries during 1956 achieved record-breaking results. Records were individual as well as general. In many cases, handicapped men and women were working for the first times in their lives. They were earning money to support themselves, to pay taxes instead of receive tax funds. They were finding rightful places in their communities, contributing to their own and their communities' welfare.

On a broader scale, the progress of Goodwill Industries was revealed by the greatest increase in its operations for one year in its 54-year history, an increase of over 17 percent.

Figures showing 1956 accomplishments are reported on the inside front cover. A statistical picture of the Goodwill Industries program is given in the consolidated operating statement below.

At the end of 1956, there were 116 Goodwill Industries in the United States and three in foreign countries affiliated with Goodwill Industries of America Inc. In addition, a Goodwill Industries was in the process of formation in Honolulu, Hawaii.