A pack of peace and love has arrived in Orlando, Florida — professional comfort dogs to help ease the pain and stress of survivors and family members following Sunday’s terrorist attack.
The dogs and their handlers began arriving yesterday from nine states as far away as Texas and Ohio.
Each dog has gone through 12 to 18 months of training to comfort people in stressful situations. Their handlers are all volunteers who go where they’re needed.
The dogs fanned out to community centers serving as gathering points for those affected by the shooting.
One of the Golden Retrievers curled up at the feet of Russell Walker, who worked at the nightclub where the attack happened.
Dana Lee Calabrese was walking to dinner in Hollywood when suddenly a homeless man collapsed in the street right front of her—and it was fortunate for him that he did.
She and her cousin called 911, as anyone might, but when paramedics arrived she cared just a little bit more. She wondered what would happen to the man’s suitcase and small number of belongings and asked the EMT crew if they would be taking the cart. Their response “sent chills down my spine,” she recalls.
“No, are you? A million more dominoes fall a day around here.”
The sign on his cart identified the man in his fifties as a U.S. Marine Corps Veteran named Douglas Dean Hall. The idea of this veteran with a prosthetic limb being treated with disrespected spurred Dana to uncommon valor. She gave the crew her phone number and instructed them to make sure he got it.
Then the Los Angeles woman in her 30s went trudging off down the street pushing the cart with everything the homeless man owned inside.
After she didn’t hear from him, and not knowing if he’d even gotten her phone number, Dana launched a plea on Facebook to help locate the man. It took weeks but finally a reply to her post: “I found him. He is on Highland & Hollywood.”
Maryam Ramezani saw Dana’s original social media post and was reading every homeless sign. “As I saw his name, I couldn’t believe my eyes.”
So, Dana and her husband, and a neighbor, headed to the area, and split up to find the veteran, who was told to stay in the neighborhood because she would be looking for him to return his stuff.
Photos by Dana Lee Calabrese and her cousin, Jackie Lezette
“I had hid the cart in the garage of my condo building,” Dana, who is a creative director, told Good News Network.
“So I was rolling the cart down to the meeting place, and I saw him coming from across to street towards me and I basically just started jumping and clapping cause I was so excited. I was screaming out his name, “DOUGLASSSS!”
“He was looking at me really excitedly but he also looked confused, because I don’t think he actually believed that someone held onto his stuff.”
“He cried several times—and at one point he screamed ‘God is good!’ at the top of his lungs,” she said by telephone. “He just kept telling me that I was an angel and kissing me on the top of my head.”
If that isn’t enough proof that Dana is indeed an angel, listen to what she did next:
“His sign said that he was looking for funds to get to New York. I’m from New Jersey, and I have a lot of friends on the east coast. So when I met him, I said ‘Are you still trying to get to New York?’ He said yes, so I said, ‘Okay, well we’re going to make that happen’. And then when I went home that night I set up a Go Fund Me page.”
It met it’s goal in 24 hours. So far, Dana’s friends–and other people she didn’t know–have donated $1,300 to buy him the cross-country train ticket, along with food and anything else he might need when he gets to the Big Apple.
“I asked him if he had family there and he said he had a lot of good friends there so he just really wanted to go back,” she said.
“I’m actually just overwhelmed by how many people have donated. A lot of the people are actually friends that I’ve known since high school but lost contact with.”
She will probably buy a Visa Gift Card to fill with the money, before meeting him at week’s end. She wants to throw an informal surprise party at an outdoor patio bar on the same corner where he collapsed, to present the gift card wrapped in a box–and celebrate his good fortune.
Dana promised Good News Network a follow-up video, so stay tuned this weekend.
Generosity hit a record high for the second year in a row, with charitable donations by Americans topping $373.25 billion.
Individuals, estates, foundations and corporations gave even more money in 2015 after setting record last year, reports Giving USA’s Annual Report on Philanthropy, released yesterday.
The new peak in contributions is record-setting whether measured in current or inflation-adjusted dollars. Total giving grew 4.1 percent over 2014, an inflation-adjusted increase of 6.1 percent.
But that’s not the only big news about charitable giving in this year’s report.
“If you look at total giving by two-year time spans, the combined growth for 2014 and 2015 hit double digits, reaching 10.1 percent when calculated using inflation-adjusted dollars,” said Giving USA Foundation Chair W. Keith Curtis. “But these findings embody more than numbers—they also are a symbol of the American spirit. It’s heartening that people really do want to make a difference, and they’re supporting the causes that matter to them. Americans are embracing philanthropy at a higher level than ever before.”
Charitable contributions from all four sources went up in 2015, with those from individuals once again leading the way in terms of total dollar amount, at $264.58 billion. This follows the historical pattern seen over more than six decades.
Giving USA, the longest-running and most comprehensive report of its kind in America, is published by Giving USA Foundation, a public-service initiative of The Giving Institute. It is researched and written by the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy.
Very large charitable donations—categorized here as gifts of $100 million or more—have garnered an increasing amount of attention over the past 10 to 15 years. In 2015, the very large contributions that were publicly announced totaled at least $3.3 billion.
“Each year, gifts of $100 million or more play a significant role for some individual donors and many different types of charities. However, Americans’ collective generosity would still be enormous even without those jaw-dropping gifts,” said Patrick M. Rooney, Ph.D., associate dean for academic affairs and research at the school. “Philanthropy is quite democratic and always has been—more people give than vote in the U.S.—and $20, $10 and $1 gifts do make a cumulative difference.”
The generosity could be due, in part, to at least two factors: The country’s overall economic environment continuing its path to recovery after recessionary times, and household finances seeming to stabilize during a time of healthy growth in personal consumption, personal income, disposable income, GDP, and, corporate pre-tax profits.
The Numbers for 2015 Charitable Giving by Source:
Individual giving, $264.58 billion, increased 3.8 percent in current dollars (and 3.7 percent when inflation-adjusted) over 2014. Foundation giving, $58.46 billion, was 6.5 percent higher than 2014 (6.3 percent when inflation-adjusted). Charitable bequests, $31.76 billion, increased 2.1 percent (1.9 percent when inflation-adjusted) over 2014. Corporate giving, $18.45 billion, increased 3.9 percent (3.8 percent when inflation-adjusted) over 2014 giving.
The only thing this little girl wanted for her fourth birthday was to take a police officer to lunch.
JadeLynn Hoskinson Gross got her wish, thanks to a Clarksburg, West Virginia officer, who even brought along a bag full of police-themed party favors and gifts.
Officer Markie Waggamon was having so much fun, he hung around to play with the toddler after their meal together. She got to wear his hat and sit in his patrol car.
“I was allowed to witness one of the most beautiful acts of kindness I think I have ever seen today,” family friend Tara Murphy posted to her Facebook page.
Critters in Canadian animal shelters will be eating with tails wagging after a man purchased a pet store’s entire inventory and donated 570 bags and cans of food.
Sean Squires heard a Petculture store was going out of business and bought all the pet food in stock before it closed its doors for good. He paid about $3,000 for $13,000 of food.
The store’s insurance company prevented it from donating the food to shelters directly, so Squires saved it from being dumped into a landfill.
The Newfoundland man has plenty of mouths to feed at home — nine cats he’s acquired as strays over the years — but couldn’t pass up the deal to help other rescue animals.
The worst shooting of its kind in U.S. history has brought out the best in thousands of people across Orlando, Florida — with businesses joining volunteers and donors worldwide to offer their support.
After broadcasters announced that doctors were in immediate need of blood donors, thousands of people formed long lines Sunday outside blood banks which triggered good deeds and kindness in a city known for the magic of Disney.
As people waited in the sun, local Sports Authority stores erected tents to shield them from the 97-degree heat while locals began bringing cases of water and cereal bars to distribute throughout the lines that snaked around city blocks.
Fast food chain Wendy’s provided food and drink for hospital workers and handed out meal vouchers to blood donors. Chick-fil-A, famously closed on Sundays, opened for employees around Orlando who wanted to prepare free sandwiches and ice tea to hand out to people waiting in lines, or to emergency personnel still working at the nightclub where the shooting happened.
By midday Sunday, blood banks were at full capacity — unable to store any more donations. Still, donors waited in line — just to schedule appointments to donate at a later time.
Jet Blue, which has a major hub in Orlando, offered free seats for immediate family members and domestic partners of the victims. One caller to a local radio station, who said he couldn’t afford to give money to help victims, offered to let family members stay at his home or use his pick up truck to get around town, for as long as they needed.
Those who could give money raised more than two million dollars in less than 24 hours to help family and partners of the victims. It is the largest and fastest-funded campaign in GoFundMe’s six-year history and had topped three million dollars in donations by this morning.
The shooting happened on “Latin Night” at the popular Pulse nightclub and many of the victims have non-English speaking relatives.
A translation company is making interpreters available for foreign families and is paying lodging for victims’ families.
Marcelo Sano, a Brazilian immigrant in Orlando expressed his joy at being able to help.
“It’s a very sad moment for the city that has hosted me so well,” he wrote on Facebook in Portuguese. “I’m happy to witness these kind acts,” says Sano, who was inspired to give back to the city he now calls home.
With reporting from Terry Turner in Orlando and Joao Freitas in Brazil (Photo: Pulse Orlando, Facebook)
Two Kansas moms started the nation’s first allergy-friendly food pantry after they both financially struggled because of their kids’ allergies.
Emily Brown and Amy Goode met at a a food-allergy support group and launched the Food Equality Initiative to make sure everyone can benefit from free groceries.
Since 2015, the pantry, located in a Kansas City church, has distributed over 12,350 pounds of allergy-friendly food to 70 families in need.
Bill Gates did something pretty cool to improve the lives of 100,000 families living on $2 a day.
“It’s pretty clear to me that just about anyone who’s living in extreme poverty is better off if they have chickens,” the Microsoft founder wrote in a June 7 blog post.
So, Gates and his wife Melinda donated 100,000 chickens to families and individuals in sub-Saharan Africa. Simultaneously, their foundation has launched a partnership with Heifer International to create a sustainable market system in the region for poultry.
Not only does breeding chickens help keep children healthy, they raise living standards by thirty percent by boosting incomes from $700 annually to $1,000 per year.
The Gates Foundation wants to make sure families can buy birds that have been properly vaccinated and are well suited to the local growing conditions. The goal is to eventually help 30 percent of the rural families in sub-Saharan Africa raise improved breeds of vaccinated chickens, up from just 5 percent now.
“It has been eye-opening for me to learn what a difference they can make in the fight against poverty,” wrote Gates.
The idea of providing chickens as an investment for the poor is not new, of course, but it sure is new for the city kid who grew up in Seattle. He admits he’s one billionaire who is “excited about chickens”.
The Oscar-winning screenwriter behind “Gladiator” is penning a new script that challenges Muslim stereotypes – a bio-pic of the most popular poet in America.
David Franzoni is at work on a film about 13th century poet and scholar Jalaluddin al-Rumi with filming scheduled to begin next year.
Though best known as a great poet, Rumi’s life is the stuff of a big screen adventure.
As a boy, he fled Afghanistan ahead of the Mongol invasion, traveling through what is now Iraq, Syria, and Saudi Arabia to settle in modern-day Turkey.
Franzoni compares the Sufi Muslim mystic to Shakespeare, saying he provided “enormous talent and worth” to his society and culture.
In 2014 he became the best selling poet in America, even though he died more than 800 years ago. Among his best known writings are The Masnavi, a six-book collection of stories and homilies, including folk tales and sacred history, that were composed for the benefit of his disciples in the Sufi order named after him known as the whirling dervishes.
“I think it’s a world that needs to be spoken to,” Franzoni told The Guardian, “Rumi is hugely popular in the United States. I think it gives him a face and a story.”
The movie hasn’t started casting yet, but there’s talk of Leonardo DiCaprio as the poet and Robert Downey, Jr. as Shams of Tabriz, a mentor who played a powerful influence on Rumi’s later writings. Through the use of huge Hollywood stars, the writer hopes to expose many more people to the genius that is Rumi.
SHARE The Mythic News With Your Friends… (Image credit: johnhain, CC)
Girls without fathers still had a date for a “Daddy-Daughter Dance” thanks to members of the Chicago Police Department.
The event at the South Shore Cultural Center is organized to encourage healthy relationships between fathers and their daughters in the neighborhood. For any of the 150 girls attending who didn’t have a dad or whose father couldn’t attend, police officers stepped in as they had the year before to escort the young ladies to the soiree.
“After last year’s event, we had several officers and the young ladies that they escorted, they kept up with one another and it really bridged a gap,” Sgt. Kimberly Woods told WMAQ News. “It let the girls know that officers are just people too and we dance, and we dance funny like your dads do.”
(WATCH the video below from WMAQ News)
Invite Your Friends to the Kindness Ball…SHARE it!
When one of her students attempted suicide, a high school teacher vowed to do whatever she could to prevent the same thing from happening to any other kids in her school.
Using her skills as an English teacher, Brittni Darras wrote personal letters to 130 of her students telling each one how special they are and praising their uniqueness.
It took the Colorado Springs teacher two months to write every letter by hand, but the pay-off was well worth it.
Handing them out on the last day of school before summer break, students at Rampart High School hugged her, cried, and one even thrust her letter in the air declaring it the best thing she’d ever received.
The idea of writing to more students came after she first penned a note to the girl in the hospital who tried to kill herself.
“(The girl’s attempted suicide) made me realize she felt like she was not important and didn’t make a difference in this world,” Darras told TODAY. “For these other kids, it’s very hard for us to know who is struggling with thoughts of depression or suicide. If she had that response–and I couldn’t see her as having struggles– the only thing I could think to do was to write every single one of them a unique card.”
Pass A Note To Your Friends, Share This Story… (Photos: Brittni Darras)
In a region known for religious violence, Muslim village farmers in Pakistan are putting their savings together–and contributing labor– to help build a church for the Christians in their neighborhood.
“This church being built by Muslims in a small community is very significant,” one Pakistani Christian told the BBC. “It shows that people have love in their hearts and if there are those that fuel the fire, there are also those to douse the flames.”
He’s being called the “Lone Ranger” of Oregon after this cowboy was in the right place–a Wal-Mart parking lot–at the right time to rescue a lady in distress, just like a knight on his steed.
On Friday morning, Robert Borba heard a woman yelling, “Stop him he stole my bike!” Instead of watching the thief ride off into the sunset, this champion bull rider grabbed his horse from the trailer attached to his truck and galloped after him.
You’ve heard of ‘mompreneurs’—stay-at-home moms who invent a new product or service because they figure out a better way of doing something? Moms like Julie Aigner Clark, the former teacher who founded Baby Einstein when she realized there were no good videos at the time for educating her toddler.
As Father’s Day approaches, we wanted to highlight the brilliant “dadpreneurs” out there—fathers who are turning their bright ideas to improve family life into successful business ventures. From better booster seats to more organic baby wipes, prepare to be inspired.
As a father of four, Jon Sumroy found it difficult to travel with his kids while lugging their bulky and heavy booster seats. Sumroy’s frustration led to the creation of mifold, a compact and portable child car safety device that is ten times smaller than a regular booster seat. Mifold brings the seat belt down to the child, instead of boosting them up and is so small it can even fit into a back pocket. Yet Sumroy says it is just as safe as the standard booster seat.
The solution perfectly addressed a need in the parenting community and, after putting mifold on Indiegogo to raise funds, the company reached their goal in just 2 hours and have now raised $1.5 million, with mifold being sold to over 100 countries on their website, www.mifold.com
Edward McCloskey identified another kind of parenting dilemma that resulted in a successful business venture. While struggling to find a way to cure his daughter’s bad diaper rash, McCloskey was shocked by the chemicals inside traditional baby wipes. He wanted something simpler and healthier for his daughter, so he created WaterWipes, the first chemical-free baby wipe. He says that WaterWipes—made with 99.9% water, and 0.1% grapefruit seed extract, a natural skin conditioner—don’t irritate the skin, and instead help avoid diaper rash and other conditions. A huge hit in the UK, WaterWipes are now available in the U.S.
Marc Toland was looking for a faster and more reliable way to alert his family to a home fire. Concerned over the delay and the often unreliable nature of traditional smoke detectors, Toland searched for another option, and when he found it didn’t exist, set out to create one. He founded Sooner Alarms and invented the PlugSafe, a device that has a heat sensor as an added layer of security. Able to detect problems at the most frequent source, the electrical outlet, the PlugSafe uses wireless communication to set off the alarm and notify homeowners at the start of a fire. His TreeSafe system detects whenever a Christmas tree catches fire from its lights.
Bryan Nooner was similarly concerned about his family’s outlets and plugs. Apprehensive about outdoor light cords getting wet, Nooner tried to create a makeshift cover. From that idea came the Twist and Seal. Made in the USA and available in a variety of sizes, Twist and Seal’s durable and patented design provides protection from rain and snow.
Troubled by the number of child drownings and lack of pool fences, Robert Lupton designed the Life Saver Pool Fence in 1987. Now run by his son Eric, Life Saver Pool Fence is the number one pool fence company in the world. Plus, with each purchase of a fence, the company donates another pool fence for free to the family of a drowning or near-drowning victim.
Avi Lele (below) had another kind of security in mind for his family: Financial security. Wanting to give his kids, nieces and nephews stock in their favorite brands, Lele found it was an expensive and difficult hassle. His frustration turned into inspiration, and he recently launched Stockpile, the first-ever gift card for stock. As simple as traditional gift cards, consumers can find Stockpile cards for sale at local grocery and retail stores. The gift cards are available in a variety of denominations that make it easy and affordable to buy stock for anyone–and maybe get kids interested in learning about the stock market.
All six dads wanted something better for their children and families, and came up with brilliant ideas. Each father turned an idea into reality, and their reality into booming businesses. Equally important, these fathers are finding a better way to juggle work and personal life. Owning their own business is helping them to be more present in family time and experience kids’ important milestones. Not only have their ideas changed their own family’s lives, they have impacted thousands of other lives, as well… a stellar feat worth recognizing this Father’s Day.
This young Buddhist child in a nearly inaccessible country buried deep in the Himalayas is inspiring people around the world, thanks to a photographer’s quest to understand happiness.
Namgay Dorji, an 11-year-old monk from a Buddhist monastery in Bhutan is covered in burn scars – but it’s never affected his dreams or aspirations.
“I come from Laya; my father brought me,” he told the photographer with a shy voice. “I was in a fire when I was very young and I don’t remember what happened.”
“Having these scars is fine with me, I don’t care,” he said with simplicity and a little smile on his face.
“When I grow up I want to be a great Lama,” he said to photographer and motivational speaker Donaldo Barros, before bidding him farewell and returning to his chores.
In the short span of just 21 days, Barros traveled throughout the country of Bhutan, which has held the title of World’s Happiest Country. Armed only with his camera so he could take photos of the kingdom’s locals, he ask questions that he hopes will enlighten the rest of the world on the true secret of happiness.
Donaldo’s photo collection, called In Search of Happiness: Journey to the Last Shangri-La, is a breathtaking social media diary documenting his 21-day journey among the natives.
“People have become bitterly cynical and so many believe that the world cannot be changed for the good,” said Barros. “Going to Bhutan gives me the opportunity to prove that the impossible exists until someone makes it possible. During my trip, I hope to find answers as to how we can change the world in a positive way. This trip is my contribution in my efforts to do so.”
Donaldo’s journey, which ended June 7, took him through Gasa, the birthplace of Bhutan and location of Namgay’s monastery, which he claims has never been photographed before now.
Donaldo’s photo of monks playing soccer simply states “Happiness here is contagious.”
While sponsored by Choki, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving ancient cultures and antiquities, Donaldo has explored some of the kingdom’s most sacred and revered sanctuaries in order to share their wisdom with the world.
All this farmer wants to do is meditate. (All photos used with permission of Donaldo Barros)
“I’ve been always a farmer,” says 66-year-old Penjor. “Instead of going to school, I would prefer to stay with the horses and feed them. I’m old now, and all I want to do is to meditate.”
A Louisiana woman was inspired to solve the mystery of who was the pint-sized trespasser caught on her security camera — not to punish him, but to welcome him to play with her dog.
On her security video, Hollie Breaux Mallet saw a little boy suddenly stopping at the house for a love pit-stop, during which he briefly hugged her dog, Duchess, before running back to his bike and racing off.
The boy was embarrassed and “turned ten shades of red” when the women showed Josh the video—but then he learned he could visit Duchess anytime — without having to sneak past the hidden camera.
(WATCH the video from Hollie Breaux Mallet) – Photos: Hollie Breaux Mallet, Facebook
When a World War II veteran with no relatives died recently, only four individuals were expected to show up for her funeral but, instead, the cemetery was packed with people— almost all of them strangers.
Serina Vine spoke three languages and served in radio intelligence, listening in on Axis communications for the U.S. Navy during the war. Later in life, she became homeless, but eventually spent her last 20 years in a Veterans Affairs hospital with no known living relatives.
When retired Army Major Jaspen Boothe, who’d once been homeless herself, read Vine’s obituary, she had a new mission — rallying other veterans through social media to attend the memorial service.
When Boothe arrived at Quantico National Cemetery in Virginia Tuesday, she found a virtual army of people there to honor Vine as she was laid to rest with full military honors.
This horse is so good at playing possum, he fooled a passerby into believing he’d been dead for days.
Recently, an electrical contractor knocked on a Texas couple’s door to tell them there was a dead horse in their field — swollen with it’s legs sticking straight up in the air.
The woman, named Kelly, had to explain that her horse, Pinto, wasn’t dead at all. She then shot a video of her efforts to get him to stand up like other horses.
“Why do you keep playing dead?” she says, “You’re embarrassing me in front of the neighbors.”
In the background, you can hear cows mooing in apparent agreement.
Pinto has his own Facebook page now, Pinto Plays Possum, where you can see the Shetland pony hanging out with the family dogs, who may have taught him the finer points of relaxing on your back.
(WATCH the video below from Mark N Kelly) — Photo: Mark and Kelly, Facebook
The baby is getting fussy in the carrier which is parked on the ground next to the mare’s stall. Every time it starts crying the horse peers over the gate with his head and gives the chair a rocking.
A single mother to the six children, Beth Laitkep lost her battle with breast cancer last month, but before her death, she asked Culley for the ultimate favor.
“It feels like home,” the eldest daughter said during an interview about her new family.
