Cape Cod Man Honored by Cape Cod Synagogue, Patriots Charitable Foundation

HYANNIS – The Men’s Club at the Cape Cod Synagogue celebrated an individual Monday night who has dedicated much of his life to helping others.

Barry Clayman, winner of the 2016 Myra Kraft Community MVP award, was recognized for that accomplishment at an event earlier this summer. The Kraft family and New England Patriots Charitable Foundation hosted those awards, and ultimately awarded Clayman and the Yarmouth Food Pantry a $25,000 grant.

Clayman said he and the Yarmouth Rotary Club started the pantry in 2010, initially registering six families.

According to Clayman, a member of the Synagogue Men’s Club, the pantry now has over 2,000 families who have required its assistance at some point.

“It’s a problem throughout the Cape and throughout the country, really,” he said. “Especially on the Cape, where the employment is seasonal.”

But this Cape Cod resident’s record of service stretches far beyond the Yarmouth Food Pantry, and even the region.

Though he joked that he first donated blood over 50 years ago, Clayman’s history with public service can be traced to over six countries across the world. He worked with the World Community Service in the 1980s and 1990s, completing projects in 14 different countries internationally.

He started out with the well-known club, Rotary International, in 1978, assisting with smaller-scale community improvement projects.

Lately, Clayman’s focus has been directed primarily at providing food for community members who need it most.

He said the number of families who have come to the pantry equates to roughly 5,000 individuals, many of them children, from Yarmouth alone. The pantry runs two distributions every week, on Tuesday and Thursday nights.

The grant awarded to the pantry, if spent entirely on food from partner Boston Food Pantry, could yield approximately $50,000 in total value, he said. But the money will also likely be divided up to pay utility and other bills in addition to purchasing food.

Clayman said he thinks the Patriots Charitable Organization saw the value in providing nutrition, and hopes that others will as well.

“It’s not being provided for appropriately,” he said. “Especially for children.”