“An injured bear cub is recovering in Arizona after a man who initially thought it was a dead dog along the side of the road scooped it up and drove it 80 miles to get help,” reports the Associated Press.
(READ the story from KTAR-TV)
Southwest Wildlife Conservation Center Photo – Story tip from Mike McGinley
In a very trendy neighborhood of Cape Town, among chic boutiques and restaurants, two advertising creatives saw from their balcony the homeless residents, too.
They dreamed up the idea of a “Street Store” that makes it easy for the wealthiest residents to donate, and more importantly, a place to give to the poorest with dignity.
Street Store poster boards with hangers are hung from fencing over which donors can lay their clothes. Boxes are placed in a neat row for shoes and accessories. Watch the video below to see it in action.
To date the concept has grown to see street stores being duplicated in the city streets of Brussels, Vancouver, San Diego, Sao Polo and a number of other cities worldwide since then. More than 263 cities from around the world have signed up to host a Street Store — posters have been translated through social media into nine languages.
(WATCH the video below or READ the story in the South African) – Story tip from Mike Kaufmann
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After getting a call from the social service agency and “without a second thought about the limited space in her house, the beds they didn’t have or the children’s clothes she didn’t own,” a Pennsylvania woman — for the fourth time — drove immediately to pick up siblings who needed emergency foster care. This time it was four brothers and sisters ranging in age from 5 to 11.
Kelly Abell and her husband Brian welcomed the children, as they first did six years ago when they first volunteered at the Children’s Home of York.
Before arriving back at her Hanover home, family friends had brought bunk beds to the house and her church’s orphan ministry also brought over clothes, car seats and side rails for the beds.
(READ the “Everyday Heroes” story from the Evening Sun)
Photo by Justice Beitzel (CC license on Flickr)
When people shop, they generally know what they’re looking for. New boots, a new necklace, a replacement iPhone charger—you could be searching for a variety of things. Why not search for companies that regularly donate a percentage of their sales to a charitable foundation. That way you can use your purchase to make an impact and feel better about it at the same time.
One Hope, a social enterprise based in California, donates half of their sales of wines, coffees, and teas to worthy causes. They have partnerships with a number of different causes and, since their founding in 2007, have donated a total of over $1 million to make an impact. Similarly, Keeper Springs America is a bottled water company that donates 100% of their proceeds to improved water quality and waterways. To date, they have donated more than $900,000 to water preservation and clean up projects around the United States.
Founded by actor Paul Newman, Newman’s Own, known for their salad dressings and spaghetti sauce, is the daddy of them all, having donated $400 million since 1982. All of the profits at that company are donated to charity, two of which are Edible Schoolyard NYC, a nonprofit that works to incorporate health and fitness programs into New York City public schools, and Food Corps, an organization that teaches children about healthy food options.
But food products aren’t the only way that you can support worthy causes with your purchase decisions. The Breast Cancer Research Foundation encourages buyers to Shop Pink to fight breast cancer. The organization, founded in 1993, has donated upwards of $45 million to research for a cure. They are unique in how they include survivors of breast cancer in their business model: they allow private businesses to become vendors for Shop Pink products on the condition that participants have been personally affected by a breast cancer diagnosis. Not only do consumers help the cause through purchases online or in-store, but they do so knowing that they’re connecting with someone directly affected by breast cancer.
When people actively participate in a cause that they care about, it creates a burst of endorphins, the feel-good hormones we experience to lift our moods and make us happy. Knowing that shopping for a good cause can boost your mental health, why turn down the opportunity to make the most of your dollar? Put your money towards something greater than yourself and shop with a purpose on your next purchase.
The Department of Veterans Affairs has reduced by half the number of veterans waiting more than three months to see a doctor since a scandal erupted at the agency in spring over delays in health care, according to data released Thursday.
The agency’s health care system for veterans has paid to send nearly 200,000 patients to private doctors in order to speed up care, part of an effort that has decreased average wait times to see primary physicians from 51 to 43 days.
(READ the USA Today story via Navy Times)
Photo credit: Veterans Administration
Littered across the surface of a dry lake in Death Valley are hundreds of rocks – some weighing as much as 700 pounds (320kg) – that have eerily moved across the ground, leaving trails that can stretch for hundreds of meters.
The mystery has stumped scientists since the 1940s because the stones can sit for a decade without moving. No one has seen them actually in motion – until now.
In a paper published in the journal PLOS ONE on Aug. 27, a team led by Scripps Institution of Oceanography, UC San Diego, paleobiologist Richard Norris reports on first-hand observations of the phenomenon.
But in December 2013, Norris and co-author and cousin Jim Norris arrived in Death Valley to discover that the lake bed (also called a ‘playa’) was covered with a pond of water seven centimeters (three inches) deep. Shortly after, the rocks began moving.
“Science sometimes has an element of luck,” Richard Norris said. “We expected to wait five or ten years without anything moving, but only two years into the project, we just happened to be there at the right time to see it happen in person.”
Their observations show that moving the rocks requires a rare combination of events. First, the surface fills with water, which must be deep enough to form floating ice during cold winter nights but shallow enough to expose the rocks. As nighttime temperatures plummet, the pond freezes to form thin sheets of “windowpane” ice, which must be thin enough to move freely but thick enough to maintain strength. On sunny days, the ice begins to melt and break up into large floating panels, which light winds drive across the playa, pushing rocks in front of them and leaving trails in the soft mud below the surface.
“On Dec. 21, 2013, ice breakup happened just around noon, with popping and cracking sounds coming from all over the frozen pond surface,” said Richard Norris. “I said to Jim, ‘This is it!’”
It turned out the rocks moved under light winds and ice less than 3-5 millimeters (0.25 inches) thick. The rocks moved only a few inches per second (2-6 meters per minute), a speed that is almost imperceptible at a distance and without stationary reference points. That means that tourists might have actually seen this happening without realizing it.
“It is really tough to gauge that a rock is in motion if all the rocks around it are also moving,” said Norris
(WATCH the video below, or READ more at Scripps Institution of Oceanography)
Photo: Scripps Institution of Oceanography
The U.S. economy grew at a brisk annual rate of 4.2 percent in the April-June quarter and India’s economy expanded by 5.7%, according to official figures released this week.
A Phoenician ship that sunk in the waters off the island of Malta around 700 BC has been discovered with its cargo in a “fantastic state of preservation.”
One of the oldest shipwrecks found in the Mediterranean, the vessel is about 50 feet long and rests in a bed of sand at a depth of 400 feet, reports Discovery News.
“There are very good chances that the wooden hull is still present, buried beneath the sand,” said Timmy Gambin, a senior lecturer in maritime archaeology at the University of Malta and the co-director of the international team.
(READ the story from Discovery News)
In Idaho, when the ‘dog days of summer’ are over and the Nampa public pool is about to close, a new clientele comes to play: The “Pooch Pool Party” allows dogs to take a swim before the water is drained for the year.
The annual dog-only swimming event began in 2007 as an idea to raise money to help build the Nampa Dog Park.
The Lakeview Pool party includes not only a dog swim, pet-friendly vendors and a raffle, but a 1-mile walk, entertainment, contests and more. Proceeds continue to help fund Nampa Dog Park amenities like the dog swimming pond and permanent restrooms, according to the Nampa Parks and Rec page.
Video of the 2014 event uploaded by Mandy Mahan shows dozens of dogs gleefully jumping into the pool for a refreshing dip.
(WATCH the video below) – Story tip from Jeffery Scharn
Photo via YouTube screenshot
Phil Bono from Long Island, whose selfless decision to teach a 17-year-old immigrant about the signage business, is finding that his good deed paid off.
Years later, with Bono down on his luck, his old apprentice got the chance to offer his mentor a hand.
(WATCH the CBS video by Steve Hartman above)
“Two Maine scientists are celebrating good news about the environment, after a decades-long study has shown that the negative effects of acid rain have been reversed much faster than expected,” reports the Bangor Daily News.
The study looked at lakes throughout most of New England and New York, and it found that environmental regulations and the voluntary actions of industry have sharply reduced sulfur emissions in rain and snow. It also found that soils are recovering quickly, without taking centuries to bounce back that some had predicted would be necessary.
(READ the story from the Bangor Daily News)
The frailty of remembrance might have an upside: When a memory is recalled, two research teams reported on Wednesday, it can be erased or rewired so that a painful recollection is physically linked in the brain to joy and a once-happy memory to pain.
The research adds to a growing body of work that suggest this might be applicable to treating disorders such as post-traumatic stress.
(READ the article from Reuters)
The ALS ice bucket challenge continues to bring in huge donations this summer for efforts to cure and treat what’s commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.
As of today, the viral campaign has raised more than $94 million for the ALS Association — compared to only $3 million raised during the same time last year.
The group now faces a challenge: how should it spend all that money. They have already begun consulting with clients, volunteers and its 38 chapters across the country on how the money should be spent.
(READ the story from NPR)
To commemorate the 20th anniversary of NBC’s “Friends,” Warner Bros. is opening a replica of the trendy coffee shop featured in many of the show’s episodes.
“Central Perk” will come to life in Manhattan’s SoHo neighborhood where visitors can interact with iconic props like the orange sofa.
This reminds us of another pop-up coffee shop in New York City, the Purina operated Cat Cafe, which was open for a week in April and featured 16 lounging cats up for adoption
(READ the story from The Wrap)
If something good could come out of the Boston Marathon bombing, James Costello and Krista D’Agostino seem to have found it.
Sixteen months after she cared for his injuries in while working as a hospital nurse they got married.
About 160 guests watched them tie the knot on Saturday in a wedding donated by local businesses.
(VIEW all the photos from TODAY – READ the AP story from Toledo News)
“Schools in Guam say there has been a massive decline in the number of reported bullying cases in the past four years,” reports ABC News Australia.
“They say the number of cases reported has dropped by more than 80 percent since 2010, from 930 to about 160 cases, after the introduction of student-led anti-bullying programs.”
“We have kids try to find ways to resolve their issues with each other by coming up with the solution.”
(READ the full story from Australian ABC News)
Photo from LoveShareCare.com
Although he insists he’s no hero, Officer Gil Benitez looks like a savior in this video showing him helping a man in a wheelchair get out of a driving torrential rain.
What an awful moment for Michael Arnold’s electric wheelchair to get stuck. He was crossing the road in Fort Myers, Florida during an intense thunderstorm holding only an umbrella when it suddenly stalled in the middle of the road.
Lucky he had a cell phone to call police. A camera mounted in Benitez’s squad car captured the incident on video, showing the officer coming to Arnold’s aid. After a scare from a nearby lightning strike, Benitez leans in and manages to start the chair moving, and pushes it for a block to his home.
Benitez reportedly helped dry off Arnold, then waited with him until his family arrived.
He was only doing his job, we agree, but we thank him for making us feel good.
(WATCH the video below or read the rest from ABC-7)
Every weekend, a stylist from an upscale salon in New York City wanders the streets to find someone who would appreciate a free haircut.
Mark Bustos fell in love with ‘street styling’ in May 2012 after visiting family members back in the Philippines where he rented a barbershop chair and provided free haircuts to impoverished children.
The gratification from the experience left him feeling so good that he brought the practice home. Since then, he’s performed this service for the poor — always outdoors — in Jamaica, Costa Rica, Los Angeles, and New York.
(SEE more photos at MyModernMet) – Story tip from Julia Frerichs, LMT
Hi GNN supporters,
I came across this wonderful website because I wanted to find a news site that shared more positive information. Something uplifting; rather than reading or listening to depressing, negative information. So I decided that I should search and; we all know that Google has a little bit of everything. I figured, there has to be someone out here thinking the same thing as me.
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I would also like to share a blog of mine that I started in order to share my thoughts, experiences and opinions in a positive way; for people of all ages to be inspired. I would like to be apart of the, goodnewsnetworks.org cause and keep the positive energy flowing. I upload new information when I can. For people out there that need inspiration, I would appreciate your support.
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A surge in demand for jets helped make July the best month ever for durable goods orders, and signaled a sustained rise in U.S. manufacturing.
Orders placed for long-lasting U.S. manufactured goods soared 22.6 percent, according to Commerce Department data issued Tuesday .
Another report showed American consumer confidence unexpectedly climbing in August to the highest level in almost seven years.
In other positive economic news, American Automobile production just reached its highest level in 12 years. The industry hasn’t produced this many cars rolling off assembly lines since 2002. Overall manufacturing surged up 1% in July — 4.9% higher than this time last year.
(READ the story from Reuters)
Photo by Ford – CC license
