What a great story..(This is what patriotism really is)

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/Northeast/04/13/town.fund.ap/index.html

Town's hospital bills paid from nearly century-old fund
Tuesday, April 13, 2004 Posted: 10:01 AM EDT (1401 GMT)



Karen Hammond, the assistant town clerk of Baltimore, Vermont, holds a photo of Ella Graves at the town office.


BALTIMORE, Vermont (AP) -- Debbie Griswold first heard of Ella Graves soon after she moved to town in 1977. Griswold owed money for an unexpected trip to the emergency room with a sick child.

Griswold kept waiting for a hospital bill, but one never came. Six months went by and she finally received something in the mail: a notice telling her that Ella Graves had paid her medical expenses.

"I said, `Who is Ella Graves, and how did she do that?' Griswold recalled. "I was floored."

Graves was a native of rural Baltimore born in 1850. When she died in 1918, she left the town $17,500. Her request was that the money be used to pay the poor's hospital bills. Today, the fund is available to help out all residents


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A nice way to start the day. :hi:

In the Bush America that fund now belongs to the government. Screw the poor.

(But it's a great story! Thank you for sharing.)