Kate McClure, woman raises 300,000 dollars for homeless man who rescued her with his last 20 U.S. dollars.
A homeless man in U.S. city of Philadelphia had used his last 20 U.S. dollars to buy gas for a woman. The woman, in return, raised over 300,000 dollars in 13 days to pay him for a comfortable Thanksgiving resting in a hotel and a new vision for the rest of his life.
Kate McClure first met Johnny Bobbitt Jr, a homeless veteran in Philadelphia in the state of Pennsylvania at a night in October, when she was driving down Interstate 95 and ran out of gas.
Scared and nervous, she got out of the car to head to the nearest gas station and met Bobbitt. He told her to get back in the vehicle and lock the door.
Minutes later, he emerged with a red gas can, which he paid with his last 20 dollars.
Bobbitt didn’t ask for money and McClure didn’t have any money then, according to a CNN report on Friday.
About two weeks ago, McClure and her boyfriend, Mark D’Amico, who both live in New Jersey, started a GoFundMe page, wishing to raise 10,000 dollars to pay the good Samaritan for rent, a reliable vehicle and a few months of expenses.
The story ran in a local paper and later went viral on social media. By noon Friday, the fund for the kind man has exceeded 316,730 dollars, most amount of the donations came on Thanksgiving Day which fell on Nov. 23.
More than 11,100 people have made donations, and the donations have been continuing, the GoFundMe page showed Friday.
“We wanted to make sure he was safe, and go from there,” McClure told CNN Thursday.
Bobbitt, a North Carolina native, has served in Marine Corps and studied nursing. He was also a former paramedic and firefighter, according to his Facebook page.
“The whole game changed in the last 24 to 48 hours. His expectations changed, and what he wanted to do changed,” D’Amico said on CNN. “He has a couple of places in Philadelphia that got him through and got him by. He wants to pay it forward.”
