Ever seen one million cards? Jerry Milburn has not only seen them, he’s carried about that many on a mission to bring smiles to kids who might not otherwise have a chance to collect.
Milburn’s Commons 4 Kids reached the seven-figure milestone last week, donating 250,151 cards to Sunrise Children’s Home in Danville, KY, bringing the charity’s grand total to 1,018,200 cards donated in just over a year.
Card #999,999 and #1,000,000 were 1989 Ken Griffey Jr. Upper Deck rookies, a favorite card of Milburn’s when he was growing up.
The project has taken him to children’s hospitals, boys and girls clubs and other charities, most of which have welcomed his donations with open arms. Many of the cards are indeed commons, but Commons 4 Kids makes sure to include some jersey and autographed cards with each donation. Milburn and his wife Jackie have put thousands of miles on the family van while carting the cards across several states.
His efforts have caught the eye of newspapers, radio and TV stations throughout the region. Those interviews have resulted in more donations.
And he’s not done yet.
In fact, word has spread so well that Commons 4 Kids plans to keep right on giving.
“We are scheduled to pick up 100,000 cards on December 8th, plus we continue to get thousands of cards through the mail each week. We have a good chance of having an inventory of 250,000 cards before 2013 so we have set another goal of donating another 1,000,000 cards in 2013,” he wrote in an email to Sports Collectors Daily.
“On top of that donation we are doing a money raising campaign called ‘Make This An UnCommon Holiday’ with all of the money going directly to Sunrise. We are trying to work with some card shops and other organizations in the area to see if we can get donations for Sunrise to auction off in order to raise money; we have already raised $200 towards that effort as well.”
You can find Commons 4 Kids via their website, where Milburn writes a blog about the project and also on Facebook.
[…] and unwanted cards to those who might appreciate them. Kentucky collector Jerry Milburn started Commons 4 Kids to collect and distribute cards to […]