A business owner realized, It's time to give back, after years of seeing needy people selling their stuff in his jewelry-exchange business. Rankin Paynter was shopping at a Kmart that was closing its doors in Winchester, Kentucky and decided on-the-spot to buy the rest of its contents and give it away to charity -- $200,000 worth of clothing, shoes, pharmacy items and supplies.
A retired man in California is one of three winners of the Random Acts of Kindness Foundation's Kindness Challenge. The wood-working carpenter is bringing smiles to the faces of hundreds of kids with handmade toys created in his workshop garage. I just love making things for people.
A 32-year-old British woman paralyzed from the chest down has finished the London marathon after 16 days of walking with the help of a bionic suit. Although Claire Lomas was not eligible to receive a medal, more than a dozen runners donated theirs, in a touching tribute after an Olympic rowing champion launched a Twitter campaign to get her one.
After surviving a year and a half of homelessness in the early 1980s, Lucinda Yates moved back to Portland and started putting her life back together by waitressing. After surviving a year and a half of homelessness in the early 1980s, Lucinda Yates moved back to Portland and started putting her life back together by waitressing. But her true breakthrough came when she noticed some colorful mat boards in a frame shop's trash can. She pulled them out of the garbage and started cutting them into elementary shapes, eventually creating wearable pins. She has sold more than 5 million pins to date to benefit homeless causes.
When asked to reveal the secret to her longevity, Bea Abrams Cohen credits her do-good attitude, helpfulness toward others, and the power of prayer. The chatty 102 year-old has worked for more than seven decades supporting philanthropic organizations and especially the U.S. military, since her service in World War II.
At the White House yesterday President Obama honored this year's recipients of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Nation's highest civilian honor. "I have to say, just looking around the room, this is a packed house, which is a testament to how cool this group is," chuckled the President, whose broadest grin came as he bestowed the medal upon the shoulders of Bob Dylan.
The World Trade Center hero who saved thousands of lives on 9/11 will now be remembered each year by the federal government, with the creation of the Rick Rescorla National Award for Resilience that will be given to civilians who respond extraordinarily to disasters. If you haven't heard of Rick's heroics, which were memorialized by documentary films and even an opera, he was Vice President of Security for Morgan Stanley, on September 11, 2001, when he personally led a massive evacuation of that company's 2,700 employees.
In 1985, Stan Brock started a nonprofit, Remote Area Medical. Since then, the all-volunteer group has held more than 663 medical clinics worldwide, providing free health care to half a million people, particularly in America where large swaths of population have no dental, eye or general health care.
Today is Take Your Daughter (and Sons) to Work Day, and while we don't begrudge the right of kids to tail their parents on this special day, we can't help but feel a little jealous of what some of them get to experience. Moms working in television, business, politics, and even Olympic-level athletic competition undoubtedly have some really cool jobs to drop in on, and we've picked several of our favorite working moms that we'd like to spend a day with.
In a country blessed with an abundance of extraordinary educators, what does it take to stand out as the Teacher of the Year? According to President Obama, who honored Rebecca Mieliwocki, a 7th grade English teacher from Los Angeles County, it is passion that makes great teachers go above and beyond.
A New Zealand neighbor who crawled into a burning house to rescue a baby was terrified at the time, but said he could not ignore the screams and pleas of family members, when another man had already failed to find her.
Before she died last September, Lelia Boroughs, 84, told her attorney she had no family to whom to leave her estate. So she crafted her will to leave her $400,000 condo to the city to turn into a homeless shelter.
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