Wal-Mart 'Santa' pays off $106,000 in layaways at 2 Ohio stores

An anonymous donor paid off a total of nearly $70,000 for the layaway items at the Steelyard Commons store in Cleveland and about $36,000 for items in Lorain, Ohio.

|
(AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File)
A worker pushes shopping carts in front of a Wal-Mart store in La Habra, Calif. At two Wal-Mart stores in Ohio, this wee an anonymous donor paid off $106,000 worth of layaway items for shoppers.

A man has paid off more than $106,000 in shoppers' layaways at two Wal-Mart stores in northeast Ohio.

WEWS-TV in Cleveland says the man told Wal-Mart employees that he liked to do something special on his birthday every year. They say he insisted on remaining anonymous.

The anonymous donor paid off a total of nearly $70,000 for the layaway items at the Steelyard Commons store in Cleveland and about $36,000 for items in Lorain. Items on layaway included toys, 70-inch televisions and even a pair of socks.

Tara Neal said she had paid $10 on a bed for her 3-year-old daughter at one of thestores when she was told Tuesday that the remaining balance of more than $80 was paid. She said it was "like Santa."

In Kansas City, a Secret Santa has been handing out $100 bills to strangers since 2007. 

This year, KSHB-TV reports that he traveled somewhere he’s never been: Ferguson, Missouri. He took the FBI, Missouri Highway Patrol and Ferguson police with him to the same places where police and protesters clashed one year ago.

The demonstrations and unrest occurred for more than 100 days after a white Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson shot and killed black 18-year-old Michael Brown.

Secret Santa is an anonymous Kansas City businessman who has given $100,000 to $120,000 each year since 2007 when the original Secret Santa, Larry Stewart, passed away.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

QR Code to Wal-Mart 'Santa' pays off $106,000 in layaways at 2 Ohio stores
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2015/1216/Wal-Mart-Santa-pays-off-106-000-in-layaways-at-2-Ohio-stores
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe