Volunteer Adds Local Flavors To Ice Bucket Challenge For ALS
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- A different kind of challenge is raising money for ALS, Lou Gehrig's disease. It's an off-shoot of the ice bucket challenge that has a Chester County man traveling the country.
Larry Kaplan is an ALS volunteer with a big heart, who's had everything from baked beans to blueberry's dumped on his head, visiting all 50 states in the month of August. He'll be back in Philly on Tuesday.
His journey started a month ago in Delaware, where Kaplan who lives in West Chester set out across the country to raise money and awareness for ALS. "It's been amazing, it's been tiring, it's been exciting it's been depressing, it's been pretty much every emotion you can think of," Kaplan said.
He wanted to keep the momentum of the ice bucket challenge going. So Kaplan is going to 50 states in 30 days where he's having locally inspired stuff dumped on his head. "The grossest thing was gumbo in New Orleans, it was gumbo, it was beer and it was rice and there was no water to get cleaned off .. and in Montana I had Moose Drool which I'm not gonna lie, that was actually good, " Kaplan says.
Moose Drool is actually beer. In Vermont it was maple syrup, West Virginia - barbeque sauce. Kaplan adds, "In Alaska I had 35 pounds of salmon heads salmon roe and salmon guts and ocean water dumped on me."
He's hoping to raise $1000,000 for ALS. The ice bucket challenge raised $115 million, which funded research that led to an important genetic discovery. "It's another example of people's money at work I mean the ALS association has been able to use that money to get real results," says Wes Rose who has ALS. He says it's probably too late for him but there's finally hope for others with ALS.
Larry says, "It's amazing the number of people involved and the families affected by it."
He finishes his 50 in 30 challenge Tuesday in Philly. So what's going to be dumped on his head? "It's going to be a lot of buckets and if you're from Philadelphia you're gonna probably figure out what's in a bunch of these buckets," Kaplan says.
He wouldn't reveal what's going to be in those buckets. Any guesses?
For more information, visit www.50in30.org.