Battle of the Beards raises money for young victims of human trafficking
By Mike McCombs
The Island News
John Hazel, owner of Port Royal’s Devil Dog Headquarters, was the winner of the Battle of the Beards on Saturday at The Fillin’ Station on Lady’s Island. But really, it was the juvenile victims of human trafficking that came out on top in the first-time event hosted by The Helianthus Project and Power Washing Man.
“We raised about $8,000,” said Rachel McBride, founder and Executive Director of The Helianthus Project. “Really it’s better than what we expected, more than we’ve ever raised in any of our fundraising campaings. We’re pretty exited.”
The Helianthus Project is a Latina- and veteran-founded nonprofit with the mission of assisting minor/youth victims of human trafficking.
The funds are going toward a very special project.
“It is all going to help us build or buy the house which will be Esther’s House, a safe house for children who have been trafficked, a safe place once they have been removed from their situations,” McBride said. “We’ll offer in-home education, transportation to therapy and doctors’ appointments and outings in controlled environments, as well as the opportunity to learn life skills for this transition period as they re-acclimate as a healthy person into society and they can continue on with their lives.”
Connor Francis, also known as Power Washing Man, along with Tim Green and Hazel raised money leading up to the event. The top fundraiser kept his beard, while the “losers,” if you can call them that, had to have theirs shaved off.
In fact, bids to be the person lucky enough to shave off the losers’ beards accounted for more than $1,000 of the money raised.
McBride said next year’s event was already scheduled for June.
“We’re going to have more warriors,” she said. “We want to bring more on, maybe four or five total. This year, we had three, … we put this together in about a month. Next year, we’ve decided to make it a full-on Viking theme. We’ll follow the same theme … losers shave their beards, winner keeps theirs. And we hope to lock in some sponsorships and some in-kind donations for next year.”
Mike McCombs is the Editor of The Island News and can be reached at TheIslandNews@gmail.com.
