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Man secretly paid off his neighbours’ pharmacy bills for years and kept it a secret until he died

Home> News

Published 15:08 21 Jan 2023 GMT

Man secretly paid off his neighbours’ pharmacy bills for years and kept it a secret until he died

He donated $100 a month to the local pharmacy under condition of anonymity

Jake Massey

Jake Massey

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Featured Image Credit: Courtesy of Tania Nix's family

Topics: US News, Health

Jake Massey
Jake Massey

Jake Massey is a journalist at LADbible. He graduated from Newcastle University, where he learnt a bit about media and a lot about living without heating. After spending a few years in Australia and New Zealand, Jake secured a role at an obscure radio station in Norwich, inadvertently becoming a real-life Alan Partridge in the process. From there, Jake became a reporter at the Eastern Daily Press. Jake enjoys playing football, listening to music and writing about himself in the third person.

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A man in the US helped to pay the pharmacy bills of his neighbours for years - without anyone knowing.

Hody Childress spent his whole life in Geraldine, a small town in Alabama, home to less than a thousand people.

The farmer and air force veteran was shocked and saddened in 2012 when local pharmacist Brooke Walker told him people often couldn't afford to pay for their medicine.

Hody handed her $100 and said: "Next time that happens, will you use this? Don't tell where it came from, and don't tell me who needed it, just say it's a blessing from the Lord."

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He kept his donations secret.
Family handout

She was blown away by the act of generosity, but she had no idea that this was just the start.

According to the BBC, Brooke said: "It continued every single month for almost 10 years. I never saw it lasting this long and he always said, 'Keep this between us.'"

And his undercover philanthropy did remain between them until late last year, when the 80-year-old's health began to deteriorate.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease was making it difficult for him to get about, so he entrusted his daughter Tania Nix with the task of taking the monthly $100 to Geraldine Drugs.

"I was shocked – I had no idea that he was helping people at the drug store," Tania said.

"He told me he’d been carrying a $100 bill to the pharmacist in Geraldine on the first of each month, and he didn’t want to know who she'd helped with it – he just wanted to bless people with it."

Hody died on New Year's Day, and at his funeral, Tania lifted the lid on his charitable secret, a decade on.

Locals were moved by his generosity.
Family handout

Word of his altruism quickly spread throughout the community, with locals final realising who their guardian angel had been all these years.

"I heard from people who said they'd been going through a rough time and their prescriptions were paid for when they went to pick them up," Tania told The Washington Post, recalling one woman who didn't have $600 for an EpiPen for her son.

"She wrote to me, saying she never knew who had helped her until my dad died. She said it brought her tremendous relief as a mother, and she couldn't thank my dad enough."

In total, his donations added up to almost $12,000, and pharamacist Brooke said it was enough to help two people a month who lacked insurance or adequate health benefits to cover their prescriptions.

Now, friends, families and locals have been inspired by his deeds and have decided to create a fund to keep the donations going in his honour.

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