8 Million pennies in 65 years

Mar. 10, 1995 8:38 AM ET DILLONVALE, OHIO DILLONVALE, Ohio (AP) _ Louis Staffilino's savings filled 40 garbage cans, weighed thousands of pounds and took four days to truck to the bank. The 70-year-old bar owner had been saving pennies for 65 years. By the time he decided to cash them in, he had 8 million of them, or $80,000 worth. He also had something he didn't particularly care for: publicity. ``I just wanted to turn in my pennies and this just got too big,'' Staffilino told The Intelligencer of Wheeling, W.Va. ``Now the whole world knows about it. I just want to be done with it.'' Staffilino spent four days in early December hauling the pennies in a pickup truck to the Steel Valley Bank, where they were tallied and deposited. The bank finally finished counting them last week. He asked the bank not to disclose his name but later agreed to be interviewed on a television program. Bank collection manager Ray Amoroso says he has received hundreds of calls from ``Canada to Australia to Tokyo, Japan'' from people who wanted to know more about Staffilino and his penny stash. The picture was taken at our Zone Conference in Chinle, AZ last Friday 3 April 2015. That is President and Sister Batt who will be leaving at the end of June when the new Mission President comes in. We have grown to love them very much. The new President will be the third President that we will serve under, at least for a few months. President and Sister Batt are wonderful to listen to, they are always encouraging and uplifting in their their talks. Sister Batt related the above story and told how she thought of the pennies as the acts of kindness we do each day and never really think about. Each act adds up just like the pennies did. He apparently started by putting them into something small inside his house, but as the collection grew, so did his need to find something bigger to hold the pennies he gathered. He ended up with 8 million in 65 years. I doubt he ever really thought about how much he was accumulating, just like we don't think about how our little acts of kindness may be adding up. Have you ever had anyone thank you for a hug, or a smile? Our acts need not be big or seem to amount to much, but just like the pennies they add up. Some people feel like their lives have not added up to much because they don't have worldly possessions, but I am confident that the true treasures we accumulate aren't sitting in the bank, or can they be tallied up by a calculator. Our true treasures are in the acts of kindness we share along the way. Conference was just another testament to this truth. I hope we are sharing small acts of kindness every day in the words we speak and in the minds and hearts of those we come in contact with. I am grateful for this time of year when we celebrate not His death, but in knowing that He lives and so shall we. Sister Olson