Wishing upon a hero
By ROBERT LINNEHAN
The Cherry Hill Sun
9/19/2009

It’s like the early days of McDonalds for a young charitable organization in the township. Some 40,000 wishes granted and rising every single day.

David Girgenti, founder of Wish Upon a Hero and a Cherry Hill resident, has been in the wish-granting business for about a year and a half now. The free international foundation connects people in need with wish granters from around the world.

Wishes can be anything, Girgenti explained. Anyone can register for the service and can cast up to three wishes, which can be viewed on the Web site by anyone in the world. The wishes range from such simple requests as a card for a birthday celebration to life-saving requests, such as a new kidney for a transplant patient in dire need.

The charitable organization stemmed from the terror attacks of Sept. 11, Girgenti said. Watching people post pictures of loved ones on buildings made him realize there had to be a better way to get such vital information out to the general public.

“I was in the same boat as everyone else. I wanted to help out but I wasn’t sure what I could possibly do. Everyone was posting pictures of people missing from that event, so I said to myself, there has to be a faster way for people to find missing loved ones,” he said. “That was the genesis of Wish Upon A Hero. How do you help someone faster? That was the mission.”

Until the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, Girgenti struggled with the best way to develop his idea. After the utter chaos of the natural disaster and the turmoil it caused the people of New Orleans, he realized his idea could be so much more than just the spreading of information. It could be a tool to help those who are in need of even the most basic life necessities.

The Web site launched in September of 2007. What went from a small idea to help find missing persons turned into an international effort that has seen some very large wishes granted since its inception, Girgenti said.

“Every few months the site keeps on surprising me. One of the biggest wishes we’ve granted was when we sent a World War II veteran back to Pearl Harbor for his 90th birthday,” he said. “This last month, a daughter made a wish for her father who was dying of kidney cancer. She wished for a new kidney and that wish was granted last month by a woman from York, Pa., who donated her kidney to the retired police officer.”

Along with the Web site, in June of 2008 Girgenti set up a non-profit, tax-exempt organization called The Wish Upon a Hero Foundation, which handles some of the larger wish requests and helps set up programs throughout the country to help the needy. Girgenti said the foundation uses corporate donations, grant money and other means to help people on a larger scale. It also holds an annual award ceremony to honor the wish givers who have stepped up above and beyond in the past year.

This year the ceremony will be held on Saturday, Nov. 21 at the Camden Adventure Aquarium. Wish granters, such as the woman who donated her kidney to the police officer, will be honored at the event, he said.

As for the future of the organization, Girgenti said he had been in talks with various television production companies to take the organization’s efforts to the small screen. Oprah Winfrey, he said, has also shown an interest in showcasing Wish Upon a Hero on her show.

But, for the present, Girgenti said wish granters (and wish requests) are always needed at the Web site.

“Everyone should go online and see who they can help. Everyone out there is a hero. People think they can’t help a lot of times because they don’t have a lot of money, but it’s not about that at all. You’d be surprised with how you can help. A lot of people like the site because they can help on their own terms,” Girgenti said. “We are in all 50 states, 140 countries, and we have members in every city of this country. We’re charity 2.0. We use the Web to our advantage.”

For more information, please visit the organization at WishUponaHero.com.