It turns out Derek Mills is more than just the Scion King. To a group of young Ukrainian refugees, he’s a cut above: Santa Claus. We first met Mills just after Christmas at his Central Ohio orchard. He grows 1,700 varieties of apples, most of which he shares with fellow growers in the form of scions. We dedicated the American Fruit Grower February issue to his story.
By April, Mills found himself branching out in a much different fashion. Recruited through his Baptist church, he joined a mission, sponsored by disaster relief organization Send Relief, to aid the 2.5 million refugees who were fleeing to Poland following Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine on Feb. 24.
“I told my wife Lisa, ‘You know, it’s only by the grace of God that we could be over there,’” Mills says. “I kept seeing those little kids walking down the street, and it was just heartbreaking.”
After 20 hours of flights from Columbus to Newark to Germany and finally to Poland, Mills wound up in Gdańsk.
“An absolutely beautiful city,” Mills says. “And the Polish people were so nice.”
The goal of Mills’ group was to prepare a facility run by the local Baptist church to host approximately 40 refugees, 20 in each of two rooms. Many of those refugees wound up being children, none of whom spoke English or even Ukrainian in most cases.
“They’re from Eastern Ukraine. They speak Russian,” Mills says. “Here I’d learned Ukrainian for nothing.”
Upon being told that the refugees would likely harbor ill feelings toward Americans, Mills set out to alleviate the situation.
“They’re just staring at us like we’re from Mars,” Mills says. “Then I said, ‘Can I pray for any of you?’”
Eventually, a little girl asked to pray for her grandfather who was fighting. Another said pray for her brother who was fighting. Finally, a little girl said pray for her dad who was fighting in Mariupol.
“Mariupol is that city that you read about literally every day that the Russians are bombing like crazy,” Mills says. “She started crying. Well, when she started crying, I started crying. I went to give her a big hug. You could feel everything in the room just change. I wasn’t this scary American anymore.”
Mills brought backpacks with him from the U.S.
“If these kids and families are having to move constantly, at least the kids will have their own backpacks,” Mills says. “Once I started to get those out, you would have thought I was Santa Claus.”
On the topic of apples, Mills proudly let everyone know his orchard in Ohio includes six varieties from Poland and one apple and one pear variety from the Ukraine. Unfortunately, no one had heard of those varieties.
“Most of the apple varieties in Europe come from France — ‘Golden Delicious’ and ‘Gala’,” Mills says.
One apple did strike a chord. With two refugee girls named Katy in his presence, Mills noted that he grew a variety called ‘Katja’ back home. Ironically, the Swedish apple is considered good for packed lunches … and liked by children. Kind of like America’s Scion King.
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June 07, 2022 at 10:40PM
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Cheers to Fruit Grower Goodwill in Gdańsk - Growing Produce
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