Tell Me a Story that Restores Your Faith in Human Kindness

Sometimes you stumble across a story that restores your faith in humanity and kindness and it stays with you for a long time. I first heard about this story online and it has stuck with me for a number of years now and I wanted to share it with you. It’s a very simple story, but the gesture that was made, had an enormous effect on one grieving widow and it shows you a great example of how doing one simple thing can make the world of difference to one person’s life.

Retired Doctor, Margaret McCollum had recently lost her Husband and like many grieving widows, she longed to hear her Husband’s voice for one last time. In Margaret’s case she was still able to do that. Margaret’s beloved late husband was Oswald Lawrence, a theatre actor, who for forty years was the voice behind the ‘Mind the gap’ announcement on the London Underground. In the month’s after her husband had passed away, Margaret would simply go to her nearest station, the Embankment Station, just to hear his voice for one more time. The Embankment station was the last station the still used has voice as the announcer.

Margaret said: “So if I had time, I would sit and wait for the next train, so I can hear his voice again. It was just lovely. It’s just very special listening to his voice after he died.”

A few months later Margaret got a shock. She said: “Much to my sadness and horror, when I was on the station, there was no Oswald. A few days later, still no Oswald.”

Oswald’s message had been scrapped as the Tube updated its announcement system. So a still grieving Margaret, sent a letter to the London Underground asking for a recording of her late husband’s voice. Moved by her story, the directors went one better, retrieving Lawrence’s distinctive, clipped tones from the archives and reinstating them at Embankment Station.

“We were very touched by her story, so staff tracked down the recording and not only were they able to get a copy of the announcement on CD for her to keep, they were also able to digitally restore the announcement at Embankment station.”

It’s a small gesture from a large organisation that made such a difference to one grieving widows life, which just goes to show that by making one small gesture we can all make a difference and make the world just that bit better for all of us.

Have you a similar story about a random act of kindness that has resonated with you? If so I would love to hear from you.

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