When Traverse City resident William Berkshire’s trailer set fire, he thought he had lost everything. He had been camped outside of a general store when the wood-burning stove inside his trailer burned down his home and all his possessions, UpNorthLive reports. Miraculously, the very next day, the store’s manager Rob Hentschel, came by with a generous gift to help him start over — his own mobile home for Berkshire to live in.
“We’re all human beings, we’re all neighbors,” Hentschel says in the video above. “I had something that I could live without, and he needed a place.” The local sanitation company, American Waste, also donated a dumpster to aid the clean up process.
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As Huffington Post reports, Hentschel’s gesture sparked a regional domino effect of charity. After he posted a photo of the charred remains of Berkshire’s trailer on Facebook, it seemed like the whole city enthusiastically pitched in to help their neighbor, who’s known affectionately in the community as “Mountain Man.” If you scan the store’s Facebook posts, you’ll find that locals generously donated clothes, bedding, shoes, blankets, canned foods, toilet paper and more. Some showed up just to keep Berkshire company. A commenter wrote, “This post makes me tear up… happy tears of course! We live in such an amazing community!” Anyone else feel like moving to Traverse City?