This teen was auctioning his pig to fight cancer. Four bidders in a row had their own plans.

[DonViejo]

Waylon Klitzman appears with Kim Katzenmeyer, his favorite teacher at Evansville High School in Wisconsin, at the Rock County 4-H Fair. (Courtesy of Kim Katzenmeyer)
By Hannah Natanson

August 6 at 8:00 AM

Waylon Klitzman’s legs were shaking. The 15-year-old from Evansville, Wis., said he is “not really that social” — and he especially dislikes standing in front of large groups of people. The auction room at the Rock County 4-H Fair late last month looked like something straight out of his nightmares: dozens of people packed into rows of chairs, all staring at him.

Klitzman took a deep breath and thought about why he came. He was there to sell his pig, Roo. He was there to donate the proceeds to Beat Nb, a nonprofit organization working to cure neuroblastoma, the most common form of cancer that afflicts children. He was there for his favorite teacher, Kim Katzenmeyer (he calls her “Miss K”), whose niece was diagnosed with the disease a few days before her fourth birthday.

Besides, it would be over soon — he only had to sell the pig once, right?

Wrong.

Over the next hour, three different bidders in a row bought the pig and donated it back to Klitzman, who ultimately raised more than $10,000 for the fight against cancer.

“I did not see that happening,” Klitzman said in an interview with The Washington Post last week. “Usually, they just sell it once! [So] my dream got bigger and bigger every time they said, ‘Give it back.’ I was pretty proud.”

more
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/inspired-life/wp/2018/08/06/this-teen-was-auctioning-his-pig-to-fight-cancer-four-bidders-in-a-row-had-their-own-plans/

[FM123]

1. Heartwarming story!

[populistdriven]

20. cute pig

[Soxfan58]

2. Thank you

There is stil good in this world.

[MyOwnPeace]

3. Great move.....

both the kid and the buyers!

[Scarsdale]

4. Great story.

Great young man, his parents must be very proud of him. Brought tears to my eyes.

[magicarpet]

5. Compassion and self-less-ness...

.... Something of which the deplorables and Team trDump know nothing about.

[gademocrat7]

6. Wonderful story.

[workinclasszero]

7. Nice to know there are still wonderful people

out there.

[unblock]

8. yeah, yeah, heartwarming story and all that. but it's torture from the pig's perspective.

[byronius]

16. Yes it is. Too bad we can't just have universal health insurance like every other smart nation.

Pigs are smarter than dogs, form families, and can learn more than 500 words.

[erronis]

29. Next you'll want universal health insurance for humans too!

I agree all pigs should have health coverage as a porcine right.

But start extending it to primates, and then canines, felines, birdy and fishy things - what will become of this world?

[byronius]

32. Some sort of dang Garden of Eden, amirite?

But seriously, the whole focus on the one guy who got help ignores the much larger problem of general misery that could be alleviated by a few intelligent steps we're not allowed to take because the wealthy a) need that 46th mansion and b) get an ego boost out of watching other people suffer and beg. It's so early primate, so chimpanzee, so Stupid with a capital S.

The future is reading this book like it's a horror story. Guaranteed. And they won't care about the kid with the pigs, but about the small handful of people who stood up and demanded economic justice.

[erronis]

34. urrite. And it won't happen in our lifetimes.

With luck there won't be any gardens of eden or elysiums or 72 virgins or tranquility for those that are robbing the rest of us of basic rights (porcine or human or otherwise.)

[geardaddy]

9. K&R

Well done young man and well done buyers.

[Lars39]

10. How underfunded is the nonprofit?

[bucolic_frolic]

11. Tales from the heartland were once the norm

This is just so kind-hearted, so 1950s. What happened to America?

[gratuitous]

15. It still happens

Whether it's my church's Annual Conference Quilt Auction or the Mennonite Quilt Auction for disaster relief, it's not unusual to see a quilt get auctioned off a couple of times, doubling, tripling, even quadrupling the donations. People will even bring back particularly beautiful quilts from years gone by and auction them again.

What's disappointing to me in these stories (and, tangentially, the LeBron James school story) is that they're necessary. We could fund schools, disaster relief, and so many other things if the taxophobes hadn't been running things for the last 40 years. People, children, students, and disaster victims shouldn't depend on winning the "good story" or "viral video" lottery to get a good education or access to life-saving health care or even a trip to Disneyland. We need to restructure society so that our common citizenship guarantees goods schools, health care, and a living wage so that families can go on vacation. The roads to the airport are always in good repair, with plenty of lanes and well-signed amenities. We could do that for other societal features that don't directly serve the well off.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

21. 👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾👆🏾. n/t

[GemDigger]

26. When are you running for office?

[gratuitous]

27. I prefer to be made Dictator for Life by unanimous acclamation

Things will be set right in no time when that happens.

[erronis]

30. If pResident dump know what those words meant, he might like that moniker also.

[packman]

12. Wonderful story - but makes me angry

that Americans have to auction off pigs to raise money for cancer treatment. Firemen in my area do the same thing once a year standing in the street with a boot asking people for money to put in it for various charities and people who need medical help. We shouldn't have to do that sort of thing.

[padah513]

13. Just when you think it's time to stick a fork in this world,

something like this happens. People can be so amazing sometimes.

[onetexan]

14. this great kid has more heart, compassion and love for humanity than the Idiot in the WH

sad! to the Idiot and KUDOS to the awesomely selfless young man. I'm sure his parents are very proud having raised such a great child.

[matt819]

17. Yeah, yeah. Nice heartland story.

Did anyone in the heartland think it was just "off" that a kid had to sell his prize pig for medical care?

It's no different from the donation cans in local stores to help someone who needs medical care for cancer, an accident, etc.

This is the wealthiest nation on the planet, and sick kids have to sell their prized possessions for medical care? Now that's sick.

[hack89]

22. He wasn't selling a pig for medical care

he did to to support medical research. Big difference.

[matt819]

23. Sorry. I missed that.

[hack89]

24. Imagine how boring this board would be if everyone actually read the OPs?

[erronis]

31. Not sure it's such a big difference. Most medical care is research (diagnose, treat, observe)

And most medical research also involves clinical trials, or at least it should.

From my many year vantage point dealing with medicine and the industry/research, I can say that we still don't know what works well in many cases and are still looking into those problems of cause and effect.

[hack89]

35. The point is that he was raising money to help others and raise awareness

not to help pay for medical treatment.

[Brother Buzz]

18. I'm reminded of Gridley's flour sack - Carry on Gridley

Reuel Colt Gridley (January 23, 1829 – November 24, 1870) was an American storekeeper who gained nationwide attention in 1864, when he repeatedly auctioned a plain sack of flour and raised over $250,000 for the United States Sanitary Commission, which provided aid to wounded American Civil War soldiers.

In 1864, Gridley supported the Democratic candidate for mayor in Austin, Nevada, where he operated a grocery store. He made a bet with a Republican friend that the loser would carry a fifty-pound sack of flour through the town. He performed his punishment with the accompaniment of the town band, and at the end someone offered that the sack should be auctioned off to raise money for the Sanitary Fund, a new organization that aided disabled Civil War veterans. After finally selling for $250, the winning bidder did not take the sack, but donated it back to Gridley to be auctioned off again. It was auctioned repeatedly until over $8,000 was raised. When nearby Virginia City, Nevada heard of the event (and where young newspaper editor Mark Twain was working at the time), they invited Gridley to come there, which he did. He then traveled to California where San Franciscans donated $2800 and Sacramento citizens donated $10000, before heading to St. Louis and the major eastern cities. These bidders added around $170,000 to the Sanitary Commission's fund, and within twelve months Gridley had raised $275,000 with his sack of flour.

Twain told the story of the Gridley flour sack in his 1872 book Roughing It.

[erronis]

33. Good true story. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reuel_Colt_Gridley

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reuel_Colt_Gridley

[Brother Buzz]

36. Absolutely true, and ironically I learned the historical nugget in a college geography class

Everyone in California knew, and used the expression, "Carry on Gridley", but most people mistakenly assumed it had something to do with the California city, Gridley.

Visiting Austin, Nevada is on by bucket list

https://upload.democraticunderground.com/10181012160

[iluvtennis]

19. Love these stories. What a caring young man!

[TNNurse]

25. Thank you, we need to see and share these stories.

We need to see some goodness.

[aikoaiko]

28. Dang it. I must have rubbed some jalepeno in my eyes by accident.

[pecosbob]

37. Hooray for this kid

and hooray for those generous Rock County bidders and for 4-H.

[Rorey]

38. Congratulations. You made me cry. NT