Last December, Buz Olian took his 8-year-old son, Jacob, to the Second Harvest Food Bank in San Carlos, where they live.
The reason for the visit was to donate $14 in tzedakah that Jacob had collected over the past year through weekly deposits into his piggy bank. While at the food bank, the Olians took a tour.
“They have so much food to give to people,” said Jacob in a phone interview. “Shelves and shelves of food. If you weighed it up, it would probably be around 3 million pounds.”
But when Jacob saw the refrigerated fruit vault, all he saw were lemons.
“I wanted to give them more,” he said. “I thought about it later, that we have a lemon bush, so I came up with the idea.”
His idea was to collect fruit from neighbors with fruit trees to give to the food bank.
So he went to his dad’s advertising office and worked on a flier. “Got Fruit?” it began. He introduced himself on the flier; he said his name was Jacob, and that he was 8.
“I wrote that I’m collecting fruit for our food bank, because they give it to little kids who need it in their lunches.”
He instructed people to put the fruit in bags, and then gave his phone number, so people could call him for pick-up. He then went around his San Carlos neighborhood, leaving fliers at people’s homes where he could see fruit trees.
On his first mission, he collected 73 pounds of fruit, mostly oranges. His father drove him around to collect it, and then helped him deliver it, too.
“It’s a lot for a kid to carry,” he said.
Since then, he has made three more trips, and he’s now up to 325 pounds of donated fruit. He also put a box for collection in the lobby of his school, Ronald C. Wornick Jewish Day School of Foster City. He’s also gotten a couple friends to help out.
Asked when he would stop collecting, Jacob replied, “when I’m finished.” When asked when that would be, he said, “Until I want to stop, or I collect 500 pounds.”
Some press coverage has helped Jacob become a bit of a minor celebrity, but he and his father emphasized that it was not the reason he continues with his project.
“I guess I’m being pretty humble,” said Jacob. “I was not doing this to get into the newspaper; I didn’t even know that I was going to be interviewed and on TV.”
However, one outcome is that the food bank has received more donations of fruit from others inspired by Jacob’s actions.
Lynn Crocker, a spokeswoman for Second Harvest, confirmed that the campaign has been useful. Typically, when people donate to the food bank, they tend to think of canned goods.
“Fresh produce is always something that the food bank definitely needs,” she said. “It’s a great thing he’s doing.”
Buz Olian agreed with his son that the media coverage has been useful. “It’s not our intention to create publicity, however, if it’s inspired some people to contribute and if this helps others to see that there’s an opportunity for them to take what’s just growing in their yards to help other people, then it’s all fine and good.”
Hearing that others have been inspired “makes me happy,” Jacob said.
Jacob’s other cause was donating some toys to the San Carlos Fire Department, which distributed the gifts to underprivileged children.
When he went toy shopping and the owner of the store found out what he was doing, Jacob not only received a discount but an additional large bag of toys to donate.
Jacob’s father recalled how, when they walked into the fire station with a “gigantic bag of toys, they were happy to receive them, but then Jacob got to spend the next hour climbing around the engines and blasting the horns.
“There’s always a little reward at the end of this,” he said. “But maybe the reward of the fruit collecting is having him see that there’s a direct effect from whatever anybody does.”