Masha had no owner and no warm house of her own. The long-haired stray lived around an apartment building in Obninsk, Russia, where residents fed her, watched out for her, and allowed her to sleep in a cardboard box in the hallway. In the middle of a Russian winter, that little box was about as close to a home as she had. On January 10, 2015, someone else needed it more.
In 1981, businessman Eugene Lang returned to the elementary school he had attended as a boy in East Harlem, New York. He had been invited to give a graduation speech to a class of sixth-grade students. He planned to offer the usual advice about working hard, staying in school and building a successful future. But … Read more
Growing up in the South Bronx, Geoffrey Canada knew what it felt like to be afraid in his own neighborhood. Children could be attacked walking down the street, and fights were so common that learning how to protect yourself became part of growing up. His father had left the family when Geoffrey was just four … Read more
During World War II, Irena Sendler was working as a social worker in Warsaw, Poland, when Nazi Germany forced the city’s Jewish population into a sealed ghetto. Her job gave her access to places most people couldn’t enter. She used that opportunity to bring food, money and medical supplies to Jewish families struggling to survive … Read more
On May 13, 2014, four-year-old Jeremy Triantafilo was riding his bicycle outside his family’s home in Bakersfield, California. His mother, Erica, was nearby, and the family cat was somewhere around the house. A neighbor’s dog came around a parked vehicle and rushed toward Jeremy. It grabbed his leg and pulled him from the bicycle before … Read more
In 2002, Magnus MacFarlane-Barrow was visiting a family in Malawi, where a terrible famine was leaving people struggling to find enough food. The family’s mother was dying from an AIDS-related illness. Sitting beside her was her 14-year-old son, Edward. MacFarlane-Barrow asked the boy what he wanted most in life. Edward didn’t talk about becoming rich … Read more