Looking out for the future of your family matters. That’s why ABC is here to make sure you have access to the tools you need to easily, and safely generate a will. Creating a legacy gift in your estate plans helps ABC look after our future and the future of our families and communities. Consider including ABC in your will and make a truly lasting impact today.

Stephanie’s Story

“Thank you for reaching out to our children and giving them the opportunity to know you and love you. Not only do they know you, but they have called you by your name, and have become a part of you. Your compassion comes from a place of enormous empathy. And I believe that’s the stuff that binds us one to another, and each one of us to that child within us.”

These are the words ABC’s Executive Director, Gretchen Buchenholz, said to Stephanie Johnson, a very special, loving person who became a cultural icon when Humans of New York featured her life in a thirty-two part series in September 2020 to support her medical care. The series quickly became viral and raised over $2.65 million. Stephanie wanted to ensure that any money remaining at the end of her life would go towards vulnerable children and decided to bequeath her estate to ABC.

The impact of a legacy gift like Stephanie’s bequest is enormous— it ensures that more children “have enough food in their bellies and a place to safely lay their heads, to hear a voice they know - a song, a time for tenderness, or a moment to spread some jelly on toast.”