At 80 years old, a Texas man known affectionately as Mr. James thought his working years were behind him.
\nHe had retired.
\nBut rising living expenses changed everything.
\nAfter his rent increased by roughly $400 a month, Mr. James found himself unable to comfortably cover his expenses.
\nSo in January 2023, at an age when many people hope to spend their days enjoying retirement, he went back to work.
\nHis new job was as a custodian at Callisburg High School, a small-town school about 75 miles north of Dallas. FOX 4 News Dallas-Fort Worth
\nEvery day, students saw the elderly man working in their hallways.
\nThree seniors eventually learned why he was there.
\nAnd they decided they couldn’t simply walk past him.
\nThree Students Had an Idea
\nThe students were Greyson Thurman, Marti Yousko and Banner Tidwell.
\nWhen they discovered that Mr. James had been forced to come out of retirement because of his financial situation, they wanted to help.
\nGreyson posted a short TikTok showing Mr. James working at the school.
\nAt the same time, the students created a GoFundMe.
\nTheir original goal was modest compared with what was about to happen:
\n$10,000.
\nThey hoped it might give Mr. James some financial breathing room and perhaps help him return to retirement.
\nThen people started donating.
\nAnd they didn’t stop.
\n$10,000 Came in Just 12 Hours
\nThe response was almost immediate.
\nAccording to local station KXII, the fundraiser collected approximately $10,000 during its first 12 hours. https:\/\/www.kxii.com
\nThe story began spreading beyond the school.
\nStudents donated.
\nStaff members donated.
\nThen complete strangers who heard about Mr. James began contributing too.
\nWithin days, the fundraiser that had started with a $10,000 target had climbed into six figures.
\nCBS News reported that more than 8,000 donations had brought the total to approximately $260,000 by February 24. CBS News
\nAnd it continued climbing.
\nLater reports put the final amount at more than $270,000. 6abc Philadelphia
\nMr. James Asked Them to Stop Taking Donations
\nEventually, there was another surprise.
\nAfter only nine days, Mr. James asked that the fundraiser stop accepting additional donations.
\nHe was deeply appreciative of the people who had helped him, and the students closed the campaign. MySanAntonio
\nWhat began as three teenagers seeing an elderly man working in their school had become something far larger than any of them expected.
\nTheir principal, Jason Hooper, praised the students and the wider school community for recognizing someone who needed help and doing something about it. CBS News
\nAnd that’s perhaps what makes the story so powerful.
\nThe students weren’t wealthy.
\nThey didn’t have a huge organization behind them.
\nThey simply saw someone struggling and decided not to ignore him.
\nOne video.
\nOne fundraiser.
\nAnd thousands of people willing to contribute a little.
\nTogether, they gave an 80-year-old man something money alone can’t completely describe:
\nthe opportunity to return to the retirement he thought he’d lost. \u2764\ufe0f
\nSometimes kindness doesn’t require one person to do something enormous.
\nSometimes it only requires thousands of people to do something small \u2014 together.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
At 80 years old, a Texas man known affectionately as Mr. James thought his working years were behind him. He had retired. But rising living expenses changed everything. After his rent increased by roughly $400 a month, Mr. James found himself unable to comfortably cover his expenses. So in January 2023, at an age when […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4195,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4193","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"views":37,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4193"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4193\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4194,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4193\/revisions\/4194"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4195"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/storydosee.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}