Below is the article in my local paper today, I live about 60 miles
south of DC.

Belated gifts arrive for D.C. sextuplets

WASHINGTON (AP) Few people stepped up to help Linden    and
Jacqueline Thompson when she delivered six babies, the first black
sextuplets born in the United States.
But free baby food, car seats and diapers lavished on newborn sextuplets
in Iowa prompted donations this week in Washington for the Thompson
babies, born last May one girl was stillborn, but the surviving four
girls and a boy, are healthy and learning to crawl.
"I .was struggling here with my five babies and nobody really
acknowledged us," Mrs,

Thompson said Saturday. 'Im not bitter about it I'm so happy for the
lady in Iowa and how the community really came out to help her.
Unfortunately that didn't happen for me."
While corporate America embraced Kenny and Bobbi McCaughey' s sextuplets
born Wednesday, corporations largely ignored letters soliciting baby
products for the Thompson children. The babies only received some
clothes and a few donations.
That began to change Friday after the media reported .the discrepancy.
"Procter & Gamble called me yesterday," Mrs. Thompson said. "They
apologized for the mix-up. They're going to donate diapers."
A Washington child care center will provide free day care for the
Thompson children for five years, and a hotel owner has offered the
family
or parents sans children; if they prefer a free variation. Still, that
pales in comparison with the support given to the McCaugheys of
Carlisle, Iowa
The McCaugheys are getting a 15-seat van to transport their seven
newborns. When the Thompson babies were born, Sisters In Touch, a
community organization in Washington ,that has raised about $7,000 for
the Thompsons since July, wrote letters to the nation's top 100 auto
dealers in hopes Of getting the family a new automobile. Two dealers
wrote back, but nobody offered a vehicle.
The McCaugheys have been promised a 16-year supply of apple juice and
applesauce, power for heating and cooling, car seats and strollers.
Letters written on behalf of the
Thompsons to local churches and government officials yielded only summer
clothes for the Thompson five.
In Iowa, several companies are working to build the McCaugheys a house.
In Washington, a man has offered to let the Thompsons lease a
six-bedroom home with an option to buy for about $165,000, said Lynda
Bugg, Sisters In Touch chairwoman. To complete a deal, the family needs
about $8,000. A trust fund Bugg's group set up last month has a balance
of only $700.
"The Thompson family is a humble and spiritual family. They will tell
you they feel very blessed. But they feel left out," Bugg said.
President Clinton Called the McCaugheys in Iowa, said Bugg, but in
Washington, "he didn't even lean out the window and holler 'Hello, Mrs.
Thompson."'

Mrs. Thompson said the donated money has helped the family ,buy need-

ed supplies. But the children need more: toys, clothes, shoes,
highchairs and two more cribs. Right now, the babies bunk in three cribs
that crowd the couple' s three-bedroom apartment. They have a two-seat
stroller. They need a three-seater so the Thompsons can take the babies
out all at once.
"My dream is to have a nice house for my family --'a nice five- to
six-bedroom house with a big yard for them to grow in," Mrs. Thompson
said.



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Cindy , RN, IBCLC  ***** Virginia , USA
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http://www.erols.com/cindyrn
ICQ # 412812