Trevor Ferrell just might be the most grounded person who spent a childhood being compared to Jesus and Gandhi.
Some 20 years later, Ferrell, who gained fame as an 11-year-old from a well-heeled suburb bringing hot food and warm blankets to Philadelphia’s homeless, is a married father of two.
“’Saint Trevor,’ they said. It made me uncomfortable,” recalled Ferrell, sitting behind the counter of his West Philadelphia thrift shop.
It was 1983 when Ferrell, after watching a news report about homeless people struggling on a bitterly cold night, first convinced his parents to drive him from their suburb of Gladwyne to the city.
“We heard in school about poor people in Ethiopia, in India, but not about poor people in America, in the cities,” he said. “That’s why I was so drawn to it.”
The boy emerged from the family car and handed a man his own blanket and pillow, sparking a greater awareness of people Americans often ignored.
As word of his work spread, volunteers stepped up to help Trevor distribute donated coats, blankets and food. Then came kudos from the White House, national television shows, visits with the pope and Mother Theresa, a book, and a pair of TV movies.
Resignation from his own nonprofit
The frenzied schedule of public appearances, fund raisers, and constant treks to the city’s steam vents and back alleys caused Ferrell to flunk a couple of grades and, at 18, resign from the nonprofit that still bears his name.
“I’d be sitting before the board and hearing about the $1.3 million budget and having these meetings about fund raising. That’s not who I am,” he said. “By the time I was 18, I had enough of it all.”
The nonprofit, Trevor’s Campaign, continues to provide transitional housing in Philadelphia and more than a dozen other cities, but it works without Ferrell. He walked away from “Saint Trevor” — no more interviews, no more awards ceremonies or speaking engagements. After a short college stint, he started working construction.
“The work was great. The guys would joke around and call me ’Trevor the Blanket Boy,”’ he recalled with a laugh. “But eventually, I just didn’t get the same fulfillment.”
He now mans the counter six days a week at Trevor’s Thrift Shop, which breaks even but hasn’t turned a profit, and he is caretaker of an 18-acre estate owned by cloistered nuns. He and his family live rent-free in a carriage house on the property in exchange for his work.
Homeless people getting back on their feet bring referrals from social service agencies and come to Trevor’s for free clothes, or dishes, or bedsheets. The agencies then reimburse Ferrell.
“For me, it’s a selfish thing. I’ve always enjoyed being around people, real people,” he said. “It’s what I’ve liked to do since I was 11 years old.”
'Bridge between haves and have nots'
Ferrell envisions the modest storefront — located midpoint on a five-mile stretch of Lancaster Avenue that transforms from a run-down row houses to million-dollar mansions — as “a bridge between the haves and have nots.” The area’s more educated and affluent people could teach poor and troubled teens to use donated computers and repair and sell old furniture, for example.
Ferrell also started accepting speaking engagements again, relying on the honorariums to support his wife and 4- and 9-year-old daughters. Ferrell, who as a teenager gave two or three speeches a week, now limits them to one or two a month.
“The most important thing is my kids,” he said. “I missed out on part of my childhood and I don’t want my kids to miss out on theirs.”
Though life is “pretty much hand-to-mouth,” he has no regrets about where it has led him. Some of Ferrell’s customers — accomplished people with families and jobs — have told him that he fed them 20 years ago when they were homeless.
“I don’t take credit for that, but it still feels really good to hear it,” he said. “I’m happy for who I am, I’m comfortable with who I am and I’m proud of who I am."