Special Report

This Month's Good News

John Harrington, Grant Suneson

Published: September 24, 2018 3:35 pm

Last Updated: January 11, 2020 5:25 pm

Now that September is here, the weather is starting to get a little brisker as fall has arrived. Unfortunately for some parts of the United States, hurricane season has not ended, and the latest edition of this month’s good news contains stories about people who went beyond the call to help others as Hurricane Florence laid waste to the Carolinas.

Over this past month, we read stories about wrongs being righted; the return of a pair of the most famous red slippers in movie history; and an attempt to help a financially strapped actress who starred in a sitcom from the ’60s.

There was good news on the sustainability front, as scientists in the United Kingdom developed a method of converting plastic waste into hydrogen that might one day could provide fuel for vehicles. And speaking of hydrogen, a German company built a train that runs on a combination of hydrogen and oxygen.

These are just some of the good-news stories that engaged readers this past month. If you want to see more, read on.

To compile a list of good news, 24/7 Wall St. used information from media outlets such as CNN and theweek.com, as well as websites that focus on reporting inspiring news like positivenews.com, and thegoodnewsnetwork.org.

Click here to read about best news of the month.

Source: Courtesy of Lucile Packard Children's Hospital Stanford

1. An encounter 28 years in the making
> Date: Aug. 31
> Location: Palo Alto, California

Brandon Seminatore was a premature baby born 28 years ago at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital in Stanford. Today, he is a second year pediatric neurology resident at the hospital. Recently he was reunited with Vilma Wong, then a nurse at the hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit, who cared for him as a baby. The nurse recognized his name when Seminatore was taking care of one her patients early in August.

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Source: curtoicurto / iStock

2. Good news on plastic
> Date: Sept. 4
> Location: Swansea, Wales

Scientists at Swansea University in Wales in the United Kingdom have developed a method of converting plastic waste into hydrogen that might one day provide fuel for vehicles. The process involves adding a light-absorbing material to plastic, then placing it in a solution and exposing it to sunlight. Scientists at the university believe the process could be less expensive than recycling plastic.

Source: Astrid Stawiarz / Getty Images

3. No place like home
> Date: Sept. 4
> Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota

A pair of ruby red-sequined slippers worn by Judy Garland in the film “The Wizard of Oz” were found 13 years after they were stolen from a Minnesota museum. The investigation into the theft of the beloved slippers lasted about a year and involved FBI bureaus in Chicago, Atlanta, and Miami. The slippers, one of four pairs Garland wore in her role as Dorothy, were recovered during an undercover operation in Minneapolis, according to the FBI.

Source: Courtesy of Frandsen Corporation

4. Heading to college on businessman’s dime
> Date: Sept. 4
> Location: Luck, Wisconsin

Students typically do not look forward to the first day of school, but a local businessman made the first day a memorable one for seniors at Luck High School in Wisconsin earlier this month.

The school principal told the assembled students that businessman Dennis Frandsen will pay the tuition for a two-year technical school to all 2019 graduates of the high school. There are 34 students in Luck’s senior class. Frandsen was born near Luck, a village in northwestern Wisconsin, and he operates various businesses in the area. He had made the offer to vocational students because he says there is a need for skilled workers. Frandsen is also paying for seniors at Rush City High School in Minnesota to attend a technical college.

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Source: Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic / Wikimedia Commons

5. Overdue recognition
> Date: Sept. 6
> Location: London, England

As a graduate student, Jocelyn Bell Burnell was not acknowledged 50 years ago for her work in discovering pulsars — a discovery her older, male colleagues received a Nobel Prize for in 1974. The astrophysicist finally received overdue recognition earlier this month when she was awarded the Special Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics, which includes a $3 million award. Bell Burnell intends to donate the prize money to the Institute of Physics to help others get into the field of astrophysics. Bell Burnell’s research on pulsars “still stands as one of the most significant discoveries in physics and inspires scientists the world over,” said Julia Higgins, president of the Institute of Physics.

Source: Courtesy of Pasco Sheriff's Office

6. Deputy saves drowning man
> Date: Sept. 6
> Location: New Port Richey, Florida

Deputy Taylor Grant has been with the Pasco County Sheriff’s Office for only 18 months, but already he’s making a positive impact. After receiving a call for help, Grant scaled a wall that was much taller than himself, sprinted to a dock, and saved the life of a drowning man trapped between the seawall and a floating walkway. According to the wife of the trapped man, he had been in the water for about 30 minutes.

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Source: Courtesy of Blaine Hodge

7. Man fights off knife assault
> Date: Sept. 9
> Location: Bakersfield, California

Blaine Hodge is a man who has your back. When a knife-wielding attacker pursued a woman into a Starbucks, others fled, but not Hodge, who put himself between the assailant and the woman. The attacker stabbed Hodge and the woman, but the police arrived and grabbed the attacker. Both Hodge and the woman were taken to a hospital with stab wounds and listed in critical but stable condition. A GoFundMe page was set up for Hodge, who thanked friends and supporters on several videos. “I appreciate all your concerns and hopes and prayers that have been going up,” he said on one video. “I’m gonna make it out of this okay.”

Source: Bryan Steffy / Getty Images for Barcelona Enterprises

8. Serving up comfort
> Date: Sept. 17
> Location: North Carolina

When disaster strikes, celebrity chef José Andrés is there. Andrés and his team served 3.6 million meals to people in Puerto Rico after the island was stricken by Hurricane Maria in 2017. Since Hurricane Florence hit, his charity served 150,000 meals to people in North Carolina, and plans to continue feeding the needy. This past summer, Andrés also helped in Guatemala after the volcano eruption there, and in California, feeding first responders as they fought wildfires. Andrés, who has more than two dozen restaurants in the United States, operates the nonprofit World Central Kitchen to help feed the hungry.

Source: Frazer Harrison / Getty Images

9. Helping ‘Mary Ann’
> Date: September
> Location: California

Baby boomers remember Dawn Wells who played the perky castaway Mary Ann on the 1960s sitcom “Gilligan’s Island.” Unfortunately for the former actress, the financial crash of 2008 and life-threatening medical have wiped out her savings. To alleviate her financial stress, her hairdresser Dugg Kirkpatrick started a GoFundMe page to help Wells. The fundraising effort hit its goal of $194,000 in less than a month.

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Source: Robin Marchant / Getty Images for SiriusXM

10. Novel idea
> Date: September
> Location: Florida

Novelist James Patterson has been donating millions of dollars to teachers across the country over the last four years. Now he’s donating more. The prolific 71-year-old writer is donating $2 million to teachers this year as part of his “Patterson Pledge” campaign. Earlier this year, he made a $3 million donation to the University of Florida’s College of Education.

Source: Courtesy of Richburg Fire-Rescue

11. Firefighters nurse hummingbird back to health
> Date: Aug. 29
> Location: Richburg, South Carolina

Firefighters don’t just put out infernos and help cats out of trees — sometimes, they nurse hummingbirds back to health. The firefighters from Richburg Fire Rescue found the diminutive bird outside their fire station, lying on the ground dehydrated. So they filled a cap with water and got the bird to drink enough to regain some strength and fly away.

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Source: Courtesy of Helen Woodward Animal Center, animalcenter.org

12. Dogs surf for cause
> Date: Sept. 9
> Location: San Diego County, California

You may have heard the surfing term of hang 10. Well, some canines were hanging paws, not toes, in San Diego County for a worthy cause. More than 70 pups competed in the annual Surf Dog Surf-a-Thon in Del Mar to try to become “Top Surf Dog 2018.” The event raises money for the Helen Woodward Animal Center, a no-kill shelter that offers animals for adoption. The dogs were judged on their ability to surf a wave, stay on the board, and show surf spirit.

Source: Courtesy of Yemane G. Meskel

13. A long war ends
> Date: Sept. 12
> Location: Ethiopia/Eritrea border

After 20 years of isolation between neighbors, the border between Ethiopia and Eritrea is open again. The neighboring East African nations were at was 1998-2000. After that, the two countries were in a state of “no war, no peace” between the two. An end to the hostility was formally declared in July and the border reopened earlier this month. The conflict between the nations, which started over a border dispute, claimed the lives of about 100,000 people. Resolution of the war was accelerated after Abiy Ahmed took over as prime minister of Ethiopia three months ago and began making overtures to Eritrea. He also lifted a state of emergency in Ethiopia and freed political prisoners.

Source: Courtesy of PETA

14. Animals plucked from Florence floods
> Date: Sept. 16
> Location: Lumberton, North Carolina

The end of hurricane season can’t come soon enough for residents of the Carolinas — or for their pets. In Lumberton, North Carolina, volunteers from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals rescued several dogs and a cat from flooded homes. One dog was found in a house on top of a kitchen counter trying to escape surging floodwaters and was rescued by PETA volunteers.

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Source: Phillip Faraone / Getty Images

15. Love focuses on mental health
> Date: Sept. 18
> Location: New York City, New York

Besides dishing and swishing for the NBA’s Cleveland Cavaliers, Kevin Love also is an advocate for mental health. The five-time All-Star launched the Kevin Love Fund, with partners that include Headspace — an online health care company — to focus on prioritizing mental health. Love’s announcement follows an article he wrote in The Players’ Tribune in March detailing his struggle with anxiety and panic attacks.

Source: Rice MBA / Flickr

16. Rice University offers tuition help
> Date: Sept. 18
> Location: Houston, Texas

Rice University, one of the most prestigious institutions in the South, announced a financial aid program offering full tuition scholarships and grants for undergraduates whose family incomes are between $65,000 and $130,000. Students with family incomes under $65,000 will get not only free tuition, but their fees and room and board will also be covered. Students with family incomes between $130,000 and $200,000 will receive scholarships that cover about half of their tuition. The new plan is titled The Rice Investment.

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Source: Greg Fiume / Getty Images

17. O’s first to wear Braille jerseys
> Date: Sept. 18
> Location: Baltimore, Maryland

It’s been a forgettable year for the Baltimore Orioles, who are on pace to lose the most games in their history. But the baseball team made another kind of history by becoming the first professional sports team to wear Braille jerseys. The Orioles donned the jerseys when they hosted the Toronto Blue Jays at Camden Yards. The Orioles were acknowledging the 40th anniversary of the National Federation for the Blind moving its headquarters to Baltimore.

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Source: Courtesy of Amy Rademaker Given

18. Wildcat fever claims car
> Date: Sept. 8
> Location: Lexington, Kentucky

It’s not often the University of Kentucky can celebrate a win over the University of Florida in college football. Excitement bubbled over in Lexington, Kentucky after the Wildcats beat the Gators for the first time since 1986. Ecstatic fans destroyed the car of one Wildcat supporter, whose mother created a GoFundMe page to raise funds to replace the vehicle. As it happens, the money wasn’t needed. A local car dealer heard about the incident and gave the Wildcat fan a car. The donations to the GoFundMe page were refunded.

Source: Bob Levey / Getty Images

19. Hailey touches them all
> Date: Sept. 16
> Location: Anaheim, California

Hailey Dawson, an 8-year-old with a 3-D printed robotic hand, became the first person to toss out the first pitch at every Major League Baseball stadium. She threw out her 30th first pitch at Angel Stadium before the Los Angeles Angels played the Seattle Mariners. Dawson threw out that first pitch next to Jim Abbott, a left-handed pitcher who spent 10 seasons in the majors and tossed a no-hitter despite being born without a right hand. Dawson was born with a birth defect that left her without three fingers on her right hand and without a pectoral muscle.

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Source: René Frampe

20. Germany launches first hydrogen-powered locomotive
> Date: Sept. 19
> Location: Lower Saxony, Germany

Germany launched the world’s first hydrogen-powered train for commercial use earlier this month. The train was built by the the transportation company Alstom and can travel 600 miles on one tank of hydrogen. The trains create energy by using a combination of hydrogen and oxygen. The trains produce no greenhouse gas emissions. The trains will operate on a 62-mile stretch of railway in the German state of Lowery Saxony.

Source: Jayu / Wikimedia Commons

21. Amateur artist’s wrongful conviction overturned
> Date: Sept. 19
> Location: Buffalo, New York

Valentino Dixon spent most of his 48 years in prison. Dixon was convicted of a 1991 murder after attending a party that turned violent. Behind bars at the infamous Attica Correctional Facility, Dixon began sketching golf courses. Reporters at Golf Digest who profiled his story six years ago believed he was not responsible for the murder. Thanks to work from the Georgetown University Prison Reform Project and a new Erie County district attorney, Dixon’s conviction was vacated and another prisoner confessed to the murder. Dixon now hopes to play the game he’s only drawn and reconnect with his daughter, who has only known her father from behind bars.