Wilmington organization helps homeless, donates around the holidays

Everyone should feel loved on Christmas morning.

That was Dorothea “Shelly” Davis' belief and what spurred her to start the Shoebox Project. Each year, Davis would fundraise money and gather donations with her church to fill shoeboxes with essential supplies like toothpaste, deodorant and feminine products and goodies like chocolate as a special treat. The week before Christmas, she would visit local shelters and drive around Wilmington giving out the donation boxes to the homeless.

Amid gathering the needed supplies for the 2020 holiday season, Davis suddenly died of a heart attack on Oct. 14 at the age of 55, just a few months after her own mother died that June.

Despite the grief her family felt, they knew one of the best ways to honor their late mother was to continue her shoebox project. Three years later, her children and extended family have made Shelly’s Shoebox Project even bigger, with plans to keep this trajectory going to make the upcoming holiday season the best donation yet.

With a birthday on Valentine’s Day, Davis' loving personality and giving nature was a surprise to no one.

Growing up in Wilmington on North Van Buren Street, Davis was raised in the church. She faithfully attended service every Sunday, sang in the choir and participated in youth group. She held higher positions in the church as she aged, later becoming an ordained minister at New Beginnings.

As the minister at the church, she wanted to do more to connect with the community around her and help those in need, the homeless population she often saw on her commute to work at the University of Delaware. Knowing the winter is a tough time, she began fundraising money to buy winter apparel and essential items for the homeless by selling king-size candy bars she purchased at BJ’s.

Spreading the word to her co-workers and family, the funds began rolling in, and she started putting together the donations in shoeboxes to be hand-delivered around Christmas. Each box was swathed in holiday wrapping paper and labeled by gender. They included a note saying that the recipient was loved and that God didn’t forget about them or their situation, sentiments Davis echoed as she gave them out and prayed for those she encountered.

After the first season of the project in 2017, she continued the effort annually. For years, Davis could be found handing out around 50 boxes in city streets, at the New Castle County Hope Center, Sojourners’ Place and similar organizations.

“It became a big thing where my nieces and nephews got involved and we would all go over to her house to help her wrap gifts and help her organize a coat rack in the basement where she would get coat donations,” said Rashaun Davis, one of Shelly Davis’ sons.

With an eye for fashion, she used her part-time job at Kohl’s to scour the racks for winter items on sale. Sometimes, she’d even use money out of her own pocket to make sure the shoeboxes were made equally and contained the needed items, Rashaun Davis said.

Shelly Davis would also pre-plan her donation efforts by asking local homeless individuals what size coats they wore or where they could usually be found to ensure someone got a useful item.

“The thing about my mom that was really so special was that she loved everyone. I mean, she found a way to really make sure everyone she came in contact with knew that not only does she care about them and what they were going through and wanted to celebrate them if they had a success, but like, she truly loved them,” Rashaun Davis said. “She truly was a person who love was part of her personality.”

A woman driving around the city at night and going up to strangers to hand them a donation box wasn’t the safest thing to do, he said, but being able to help those who needed it most, despite the risks, was the type of person his mother was.

Shelly Davis could always be found dancing and singing, pastimes she loved. And for those who knew her, her laugh and how it could brighten up a room is what they often remember. Selfless and easy to talk to, she always lent a listening ear, gave advice and could be trusted to turn a bad day around. She was a pillar of her church and the backbone of the Davis family.

All things considered, Shelly’s Shoebox Project is the ultimate extension of her lifestyle and the philosophy of giving back that she lived by. It was a way for her to be a beacon of hope.

“I’m sure not many of them have a lot of people thinking about them and buying them Christmas gifts, or even a place that they can put their belongings,” said Rashaun Davis of the donations’ recipients. “I think that she truly felt that that was her purpose and that’s what she was put on this Earth to do.”

After Davis' shocking death during an already grievous time, the Davis family was determined to continue the season’s Shoebox Project that their mother had already started.

“We got together as a family almost immediately after her passing. The first thing we said was, ‘We’ve got to make sure we do right by her and get this done,’” Rashaun Davis said. “For her to pass and for this thing to just completely die, that would be – in my opinion – the ultimate disrespect.

“In honor of her, we can’t let this die.”

The first season without their matriarch was tough for the Davis clan. They didn’t know Davis' system as she did. She couldn’t guide them through organizing everything or collecting items. They were worried about messing up her standards for each shoebox, and more confused about how to deliver them.

But even though she was gone, Davis' connections from years of charity work helped the family get through it. Previous donors continued their support, sharing that it was “beautiful” to see Davis' efforts live on through her family, her son said.

Since then, the Davis family has sought to expand the project to serve as many people as possible.

As the dean of students and a track and football coach at Saint Mark’s High School, Rashaun Davis often gets donations from his Spartan family. One friend who works at a dentist’s office donates oral hygiene products, while another collects donations at his bar.

In the last four years, the Davis family put together 250 shoeboxes and handed out 90 coats. Shelly’s Shoebox Project has partnered with the Monday Club and Veterans Affairs to further its mission, and the University of Delaware also has been a steadfast supporter since Davis' death, donating 35 pre-wrapped boxes in 2023. The project received so much support last year that Rashaun Davis still has 60 leftover boxes in his attic ready for the next round of donations.

“Just the way that we’ve been able to really bring people in and help them feel like they’re doing something charitable, that they’re doing something nice during the Christmas season, has really been special,” he said.

The Davis family and their friends will gather later this year to organize donations, pizzas ordered and shoeboxes ready to pack on “wrapping day” at Rashaun Davis' house. He hopes that his mother is looking down on them and smiling, knowing that her passion project prevails and that her children continue living by the values she instilled in them.

“I truly pray that she’s proud and that she feels accomplished. To be able to start something while you’re living and for it to continue when you’re no longer there means that not only did you really make your impact, but you did things the right way,” Rashaun Davis said. “You did something that people want to be a part of and people are benefiting from.”

Shelly’s Shoebox Project hopes to hand out 150 shoeboxes for the 2024 holiday season between Dec. 18 and Dec. 22, its biggest donation effort yet.

The following items are being accepted as donations for Shelly’s Shoebox Project:

For information about dropping off donations or other questions, contact Rashaun Davis at (302) 252-1243 or Rodric Davis at (302) 983-6235.

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