Every Wednesday, a group of hungry teens show up at Peggy Winckowski’s house.
They’re all students from Bishop DuBourg High School in St. Louis, ready to enjoy a hug with ‘grandma’ and a plate of hot food as part of what they together term the Wednesday Breakfast Club.
The Breakfast Club took on a new meaning when ‘Grandma Peggy’ lost her grandson Sam Crowe, a Bishop Dubourg sophomore, to a hit and run last year. It was he who first started the Breakfast Club, which used to meet at a nearby diner. One day he announced “my grandma can cook better than this,” and so it was that the unimpressive diner was abandoned in favor of Grandma Peggy’s.
Every Wednesday, a baker’s dozen teens would show up for bacon and eggs, until the fateful July day when the group learned of Sam’s death, and breakfast became the last thing anyone felt like thinking about.
That is, until the very next week, when hoping to make the spirit of her grandson proud, Peggy was up before dawn warming skillets, cracking eggs, and whipping batter. And not wanting to be poor guests, the teens came back, in greater and greater numbers just about every Wednesday afterwards.
“Sam would be so proud,” she said.. “Look at what he started, it melts my heart.”
“We benefit from her, she benefits from us,” added Breakfast Club member Mya Dozier. “It’s like we feed off each other.”