January 23, 2013

• LITTLE HEROES WITH BIG HEARTS

   

  I was feeling down and went traveling through the Internet highway in search of something to cheer me up.  I don’t know how I stumbled into the “My Hero Project”, but was very glad I did.  I found a lot of little heroes with big hearts who did big things.

   

  This is Alexandra Scott, who was diagnosed with cancer before the age of one.  She wanted to help other children with cancer so she opened a Lemonade Stand to raise money for cancer research.  She was four years old when she opened her first stand but managed to raise $2000 in the first year.  People heard of Alex’s lemonade stand and joined her cause by opening more stands to raise money for cancer research.  Before she passed away at the age of eight, she had raised a total of $700,000 which was just short of her goal of one million.  But, her cause is carried on by others in the Alex’s Lemonade Foundation, which has raised millions over the years for childhood cancer research.

  Her foundation’s goal is the same as the day Alex started her first lemonade stand. They fight childhood cancer, one cup of Lemonade at a time.

   

  

   

  And, this is Anthony D. Leanna, who at the age of ten, spent a lot of time in the hospital with his grandmother who was battling breast cancer.  Anthony noticed that many of the patients on the floor had no hair, so he decided to start a community project called “Heavenly Hats.”  He started this project in 2001 when he was ten years old.  He held hat drives and drove through communities collecting brand new hats for cancer patients and patients who have lost their hair due to medical treatments.  “I wanted to provide comfort, warmth and kindness to people who were going through a rough time,” he said.  His foundation has raised over 1,200,000 hats for patients since then.

  In the words of one of the patients, “The hats you sent me not only brightened my day, they brightened my life.”

   

  

  Now meet Brandon Keefe, who overheard a conversation his mother was having about the lack of a library in a local home for orphans.  He went home and thought about the books he had outgrown and he knew his friends had some too.  He went to school the next day and began a book drive and he collected 847 books.  Local volunteers helped catalog the books and the Rotary Club donated shelves, tables and chairs.  The orphans now had a library.

  But, Brandon didn’t stop there.  He went on to organize another book drive when he entered the seventh grade.  That drive collected over 5000 books, too many for the small library in the orphanage to handle.  So, he found a local public school who had pine cones instead of books on their shelves.  After receiving the books from Brandon and his volunteers, the principal of that school started to spread Brandon’s idea though-out the Los Angeles School District as a method to fill school libraries.

  In Brandon’s humble words, “It’s great to know you made a difference and things are going to change because of what you’ve done.”

  There are many more wonderful stories on the “The My Hero Project” website.  If you’re ever feeling down and need someone to inspire you, visit this website and meet some more little heroes with great big hearts.  You’ll be surprised at how many are there for you to meet.  

   

   

  • 4:13 am
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