Our Friend Lost it All & We Want to Help!

A Mom, Dad, and 4 Kids are Left with Nothing

On Wednesday, May 4th, our Kitchen Manager (at the Old Black Bear Taproom), his Mom, Stepdad, and three younger brothers were fortunate to wake and escape a fire engulfing their home.

It took fire crews from 4 different jurisdictions to get the fire under control.

The children's grandfather owned the home, which unfortunately did not have homeowner's insurance.

The home is gone and so are the belongings of 4 children, two adults, and the possessions of the grandfather that was selflessly allowing his family to live in his home.

It Could Have Been So Much Worse

It isn't lost on anyone that this could have ended much differently. Everyone is so very thankful to be relatively unscathed. But because of this unfortunate disaster, the family is separated---staying in various parts of North Alabama.

There is a fundraiser for Jaedon's mother, step-father, and his three younger siblings. We encourage supporting both fundraisers, but we want to make sure that our friend is blessed with an opportunity out of this tragedy.

Jaedon has been a wonderful employee, a good friend to all of us, and is driven and extremely talented in the kitchen.

For four years he has shown a dedication to succeed and a desire to ensure that the food that we serve to the great people of Madison exceeds all expectations of our guests.

Jaedon is currently sleeping on my sofa (at night, not necessarily at this moment). And while Dawn, myself, and our dogs love him dearly, we want to help him get back 'on his feet' with this fundraiser.

We aim to set him up with a furnished apartment for 12 months.

Any additional funds that we raise would go to his grandfather to help him replace a portion of what he lost. And he lost a lot.

Old Black Bear will match every donation, dollar-for-dollar, up to $5,000.

Any donation amount will help and if you are unable to donate, please 'share' this fundraiser with your networks, your friends, your family, and on social media.

As mentioned above, we will match every donation, up to $5,000. We do our best to treat our employees right and honestly do consider them family. So for now, this is our best idea to make the greatest impact on Jaedon's life and turn a bad situation into one that we hope is a catalyst for many more good things in his future.

Cheers ,

Todd