Photo: Peter M. Pitkin

Extraordinary happenings in Greenwich, New York

By the time 76-year-old Loris Brownell stepped off for the May 6 CROP Hunger Walk in Greenwich, New York, he’d already traveled a few miles in search of support.

“I do all the businesses within three miles. I hit ‘em all, and a lot of individuals, too,” says Brownell, explaining how he came to raise $6,800 to help stock the shelves of local pantries and to help fund Church World Service hunger fighting projects around the world.

“I’m an old gabber and when I come around with my CROP envelope they know what I’m coming for. I’m giving them an opportunity to participate.” And participate they do, with donations ranging from one dollar to the $500 from a businessman who decided to double his contribution this year.

By the time Brownell finished, 338 friends and neighbors had given him donations. The money he collected eventually amounted to more than half of the $12,126 raised in the Greenwich Walk -- this, in a town of just over 1,000 residents.

“It’s for a good cause,” says Brownell, who attends North Cambridge United Methodist Church. “That’s what got me started. I had seen the walkers, but I never got involved. Then I learned at church that 25 percent of the money goes back to food pantries in the area. I liked that.”