Levittown Bagel Shop Serves Up Meals To Medical Workers During Pandemic

As an expat from the United Kingdom, James Drury, who owns Keystone Bagels in Levittown with his wife Laura, thinks his country’s famous wartime national slogan, “Keep Calm and Carry On,” along with a major dose of charity and community solidarity is the right approach to dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic.

“We are ex-military and we wanted to show everyone there was nothing to be crazy about,” Drury said.

Keystone, formally Billy’s Bagels in Falls Township, was purchased in 2016 by the couple after they met together as a result of being deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Now, under the banner of the “Adopt a Hero” scheme, the restaurant is giving donors the option to purchase meals in sets of five, 10, 25, 50, or 100 at the price of $5 per meal to be granted to local healthcare workers.

The initiative, launched on April 9 after approval from the county health department, has resulted in three deliveries to St. Mary Medical Center in Middletown, two to Jefferson Hospital, and one each to Lower Bucks Hospital and a hospital in Trenton, according to Drury.

Drury’s business has delivered at least 1,000 meals in total. 

“It is ultimately the Levittownians who have pulled together,” Drury said. “All we did was create an avenue. The response was huge.”

In fact, the restaurant’s largest donor so far, Bethel Church, is situated in in Philadelphia, and donated 400 to staff at three hospitals at the end of April, according to their Facebook page.

Toni Scialanca, pastor of operations and strategy, said the move was made by Valarie Banks, Bethel’s director of community outreach, after the church vowed to use money set aside for cancelled in-person Easter events to put something into the community.

“Keystone Bagels came up on social media, as soon as we learned it was lunches for nurses and health care workers we said ‘absolutely,’” Scialanca said.

“We’re far into Northeast Philly but we figured it would be a good cause, it’s a local group. We would love for anyone to participate in this.”

Keystone Bagels ’s volunteer efforts initially consisted of a move to set aside $2,000 for free cream cheese bagels and orange juice for students who had lost their free school meals, a program which began on March 15 and has since concluded, and the donation of some trays and boxes of gloves to St. Mary Medical Center.

These actions came just two days after the restaurant, situated on Mill Creek Parkway, began advertising contactless delivery on which was expanded four days later to contactless pick-up. 

In keeping with Drury’s no-panic attitudes, Keystone Bagels has sought to highlight the lack of changes needed to the restaurant’s normal operations amidst the pandemic.

“We have an open kitchen, we are always very clean, it’s hard to say we are going to do this different,” he said, although the restaurant has made a few gestures towards people’s obsession with the pandemic, such as the introduction of a themed “quarantine sandwich.”

Drury believes people will return to their ordinary routines and consumption habits relatively soon after the end of the pandemic.

“When you’re at sea and the storm hits, it’s important you ride out the storm, and that’s when you’re really going to prosper, he said. “I think that is why we are still staying okay.”

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