After his tore of duty, he came home to find that his Scoutmaster had to give up his old troop due to his health. He knew how things were across the country from his experience while in the military, and he knew things weren't any better at home. He decided to take over the old troop, troop #1.

 

Like other troops he had in the military, there were scouts in troop #1 who come from problem homes, broken homes and needing a guiding hand. He told me a story about a couple of boys at his meeting one time that he had to dismiss them and send them home until next meeting.  He washed his car earlier that day and it was looking pretty good.  After the meeting he went out to get in his car and eggs were broken all over his nice clean car.  He knew who done it and he took a drive to their home.  He parked behind their home in the alley and saw them outside.  He asked them if they threw the eggs at his car, and he said OK then.  I am going to the police station and tell them what happen and when they find out who did it I am going to file charges.  He started back to the car and they said, we didn't do it Mr. Foster, but we will wash your car.  They got themselves a bucket of soapy water and rags and began washing the eggs off of it.  He got such a big kick out of it, he still talks about it today.  He loved the scouting program and what it did for boys, but it didn't provide what the boys needed most, a personal relationship with someone who cares.

 

He heard on the radio or somewhere of how big brothers were needed for children from broken homes. He signed up to be a big brother, but it was taking too long to be matched with a little brother. One day he met with Mr. Harry Weinbrecht at the collage, which was on the board. Mr. Weinbrecht told him that the reason it was taking so long is because the program had no one to take care of it the way it should be run.

 

My dad thought about it for a while, as he worked with the scouts, and decided to talk with Mr. Weinbrecht about taking over the Big Brother Program of Scioto County. The program begin picking up, big brothers were signing up, parents were signing their boys up and things were looking up for the organization.

 

Some parents were asking about their girls having a big sister. There was no big sister program in Scioto County and dad started the first big sister program in our area. The program was a big success.

 

Dad worked for the state as a Correctional Office at the OP in Columbus and later transferred to SOCF in Lucasville when it opened. Loving to work with children, he became a substitute bus driver for Washing Township where he drove for a couple years. While in the military, he drove a bus for the scouts in his troop. In fact, he got his driving license in the military and used the bus to get them. He said he took his test in the bus and he asked the instructor about parallel parking and he told dad if he could drive this thing, he could drive anything. Needless to say, his first driving license was a Chauffeur license.

 

Dad had a better offer to drive for the Portsmouth City School District and he took it. It wasn't long before he had a full time route and he was liked it so much that he was given a job to drive the handicap route where he stayed for thirteen years. He left the prison job to work his full time job as a bus driver. He liked it as a bus driver because he could volunteer his time to work with the youth between bus runs.

 

There was only one thing wrong with the Big Brother & Sister Program that he could see, it was for children from broken homes, not for everyone. There were a lot of children in the community who needed help that had both parents at home. He said there were children with both parents at home that needed more help than some of the children from broken homes.

 

Dad has been a Christian every since I can remember. Perhaps that is why he thinks so much of others and their needs.

With him being so strong in church and serving the Lord, he felt there was more to be done for the youth in Scioto County. During one of his board meetings he thanked every one who had worked so hard and made Big Brother & Sister of Scioto County such a great program for children from broken homes. He told everyone he felt like there was more to be done in the community for the youth. He turned the program over to the board and started a program for the children in the community that helped children with about every need and situation in their young lives.

 

The program was known as the “Apostolic Boys & Girls Club” at first, but dad changed it to, “Kids For Christ Foundation”. He didn't want anyone to think it was for any certain church.  It was for anyone who wanted to join.   He had attorneys, local schools, judges, children service, business people and others involved. The organization was open to any boy or girl of all ages.

 

In the organization he worked with and helped children who were raped, molested, abused and very much in need. He visited their homes, school, visited them in the county jail, stood up for them in Juvenal Court and worked through Children Services. I can recall one year when mom and dad took in a mother and her two children that were homeless until they could find a place for them. One year they went to a children's home in Blue Mountain Mississippi for a visit in hopes of being able to send children there, only to find out that it couldn't be done, according to state law.

 

One of the children in the program was sliding down a sliding board one time in the old Scutter School play ground. They were sliding on their stomach. He was catching himself with his hands on the blacktop and broke both of their wrist. As he lay in the hospital, he couldn't feed himself. During dad's visits with him, dad would feed him.

 

Another time dad was getting ready for one of his annual summer camps for the kids one year, and this little girl was all excited about going. She lived close to dad's office and she started to run across the street in front of her house to go tell him she could go. She didn't make it, a car hit her.

 

Her mother recalls standing over her little girl crying and yelling, pray Bro. John, pray. She thought dad was standing there with her, but he wasn't. Dad would go to the hospital several times and pray for her. She lay there in a coma for several weeks, but dad didn't give up on her. One evening, she came out of it, dad's prayer was answered. It took a lot of time and therapy, but she could finally go out and play. You would think those children belonged to him the way he worried about them and was there for them when they needed him.

 

He was in contact with a minister visiting from Nairobi Kenya as a missionary and told him about Kids For Christ and the minister liked it so well that he asked dad if he would help him form a program in Kenya. It wasn't long before dad was getting some good reports back from the minister. Children were getting help in that part of the world because of dad's program. He would box up children's clothing and things to send to them.

 

He held weekly meetings with the children at his church, every summer he held summer camp, took them on trips, field trips and outings. He had a Christmas program each year for the children where they had a nice hot dinner and received toys and a food basket. Such people as Bob McEwin, Roy Rogers sister, Superintendents of local schools, ministers, Mr. Shipley of the Portsmouth Police Department, Judge Kirsch, the fire department and many others came to his camps to speak and entertain the children. He started a program called, “Kid Minded Day,” to recognize local children who went above and beyond the call of duty. Senator H. Cooper Snyder and his wife, among others, would attend to help recognize the children.

 

Dad use to have telethons, radio programs, and articles in the news media to make people aware of the needs of the children in our area. When it came to the children, he would fight city hall to protect them. He joined hands with a group in Columbus called, “Collegian of Concerned Citizens,” that was fighting against pornography and child pornography.

 

He attended meetings, sat in seminars and keep in touch with Judge Kirsch of what he was doing. He held meetings with groups, ministers and anyone who would listen. At a seminar held in Cincinnati with detectives, law enforcement personnel, judges, attorneys and others who were in the fight. What he saw and heard upset him more than ever and he was more determined to do something in Scioto County.

 

He ask store owners to please put up partitions in their stores for such items and put adults only. When they refused, he and his board brought it to the city counsel meeting. To name a few of the board members were Dr. George Pettit, Attorney Hank Harcha, Billy Graham and others served on his board. It was a long hard battle, but dad got his point across, some of the business places complied or went out of business.

 

In 1981 dad wrote his first and last book titled, “SUFFER THE LITTLE CHILDREN.” He wrote about his experiences of working as a Correctional Officer in the Ohio State Prisons, about child abuse, neglect and sexual abuse. He told how to recognize it and what to do about it. He warned parents of drug abuse, pedophiles, and who to contact for help in these situations.

 

His book was placed in the Portsmouth Public Library and on the Book Mobile and used by high school children and collage students for research and book reports. Not just in Scioto County, but in other areas of the state.

 

He thought the public needed to be more informed and opened a Child Abuse Center in an old store front on 8th Street in Portsmouth and gave out pamphlets, literature and information. Children in the neighbor hood would come to him crying and talk to him about what was going on in their life. He held meetings there for children to encourage them and let them know that God cared.

 

Dad contacted one of grandpa's childhood friends, Roy Rogers and told him of his work for the children in the area and he made a tape for dad to be put on the radio stations. He went around to local school principals, the city manager at the time, the police chief and such people and they made recordings about his work to play on his radio and TV programs.

 

One year, during one of his telethons, he talked about wanting a place in the country where he could take the children for meetings, camping, for summer camp, a place where the children could play to get them off the streets and out of the city for a few hours.

 

Someone called in and said they had a couple of acres with a big barn that he would like to let us use. To make everything on the up and up, dad wanted to pay something and have a leas signed. The man said how about $1.00 for 15 years.

 

As a boy I can remember having some great times on that farm. A lot of city children didn't know what a great dad I had to spend his life reaching out to them. There wasn't anything he wouldn't do for them. The things he seen and experience as a child and his time in the military made him want to do

something at home for kids who were having such a hard time with life.

 

Dad was getting up in the years and not able to keep up with everything and the children and he had to slow down. He had to give up all the volunteer work he had done throughout the years. He didn't like the idea, but he had no choice.

 

He didn't like the idea of being idle with nothing to do other than church work. As a veteran of the Vietnam era he knew how hard things were for our veterans. He didn't like the way veterans were being treated and the way they were suffering at the hands of our government. It didn't seem like anyone cared.

 

Dad heard about the program and liked what he heard. For two years in a row, he had two foreign exchange students from Germany come to stay with him to attend school in Wheelersburg. One of the student's parents ask him to bring their son home and invited him to visit with them for a few weeks. It was something that could happen once in a life time for him.

 

Dad invited them to come to America and stay with him for a visit. Philipp, his first student, joined the Navy after graduating high school and got a pass for a few days and brought his parents to stay with dad for a few days last winter. Dad was able to baptize Philipp before he went back to Germany as a foreign exchange student and during their visit this time he was able to baptize Philipp's parents. They hope to bring their other son, Christian, with them next time in hopes of seeing him baptized.