December 4-10, 2003

city beat

Trevor's All Grown Up

Now and then: Trevor Ferrell stands outside his thrift shop. Photo By: Michael T. Regan

Twenty years later, he's still looking out for the homeless.

by Rob Gerth

An older white-haired woman walks into a Lancaster Avenue thrift shop and bellows, "Where’s Trevor?" A 6-foot-2 guy, wearing a "Life is Good" baseball cap, a day’s growth of beard and an embarrassed smile, stands up and says, "That’s me."

"Na-ah," she responds. "I remember you when you were 11."

He gets that a lot.

Twenty years ago, Trevor Ferrell was a sixth-grader from Gladwyne. On Dec. 8, 1983, he saw a news report explaining that it was a "code-blue" night, meaning it was so cold that Philadelphia’s "street people" were being taken into shelters.

"I thought it was one person who was living on the street," says Ferrell, now the 31-year-old manager of a namesake West Philadelphia thrift shop. "I wanted to go see this man." So he pestered his dad until he took him into Center City, where he gave one guy a blanket and discovered a world inhabited by thousands of hungry and homeless men, women and children.

"That played in my head all night long," he recalls.

Soon Ferrell, his parents, brother and two sisters were making nightly trips to feed and comfort the homeless. Word spread quickly about this saintly little boy. Before long, his family was preparing hot meals and sandwiches for 100 people a night.

Church groups and service organizations started chipping in, filling the Ferrells’ freezer with casseroles and homemade meatloaf, pot roast and chicken dinners. A couple of vans were donated and volunteers took to the streets helping Ferrell make his nightly rounds.

It got so big that the city sent him a letter, but not to praise him. "[They] said we were encouraging homelessness," Ferrell remembers. "The food was good, but come on!"

In less than two years, "Trevor’s Campaign" became a million-dollar nonprofit with hundreds of volunteers; a board of directors that included the late John Denver, Pat Boone and C. Everett Koop; a homeless shelter (Trevor’s Place); a book deal for his dad (Trevor’s Place: The Story of the Boy Who Brings Hope to the Homeless); and a TV movie (Christmas on Division Street aired in 1991 with Fred Savage as Trevor).

In the press, Ferrell was compared to Jesus and Ghandi. The rest of his childhood was filled with speeches, TV interviews, introductions to the Pope, Mother Teresa and Steven Spielberg. Ferrell even sat next to Nancy Reagan when the president introduced him during the 1986 State of the Union address.

As a youth, he gave the homeless a helping hand.

Because he was never in class, Ferrell failed the sixth and eighth grades, and even summer school one year. He says he had a "great" childhood before he was famous and a "good" one after. "I can never get that back," he says, "but I’m not complaining. I’m proud of who I am today."

When he was 18, he and his family left Trevor’s Campaign. (Today, the group is still helping the homeless through Trevor’s Place transitional housing at 1624 Poplar St., and has 19 affiliate chapters across the country.)

"I just wanted to try and be something other than that," says Ferrell, who got an unlisted phone number and took a job working construction.

Then he spent a couple of semesters as a communications major at Cabrini College, and even gave acting a try, but realized he enjoyed working with his hands more. Ferrell thinks if he had it to do over, he’d be a custom home builder.

Just this summer, he took a job as caretaker of an 18-acre estate owned by a group of cloistered nuns. In exchange his family lives rent-free in their carriage house.

Trevor’s Thrift Shop and Distribution Center, on the 6200 block of Lancaster, has been in business almost from the day he left Trevor’s Campaign. "I’m still drawn to it," says Ferrell, who rents a space jammed with the essentials for day-to-day living, and maybe an antique or two. Graduates from homeless shelters are referred to Ferrell and he provides, free of charge, the things they need to start their lives over.

"It’s probably a little selfish," he says, "but I get something out of what I do here." Ultimately, he’d like to open a learning center where young people would get free vocational training. "As I’ve gotten older my interest has gone towards the kids," he says, "but I still have a heart for the homeless."

Ask him what he’s been up to the last decade and he’ll hand you a taped-up thrift-shop frame with an 8-by-10 of his two daughters, Katy, 9, and Meghan, 4. "Here’s my best work," he proudly says.

Ferrell supports his family mainly with honorariums from speaking engagements, which will amount to roughly $30,000 this year. He still gets requests from around the country but limits himself to one a month. (Last month, he spoke to a group of inner-city kids in Cleveland.)

Contrary to what some may think, he never got rich being Trevor. He smiles sincerely as he says that money isn’t a priority except "when my daughters’ school bill is sitting on the table."

Katy came home from school one day and showed her daddy the mention of him in her classmate’s religion textbook. Other than that, his kids don’t know how famous their father was.

And before the question can even be asked, Ferrell says, "I would take her downtown. … I just wouldn’t let it get out of hand."

Now, instead of packing a van with food and blankets for strangers at the end of every day, his nightly trip is a two-mile walk with his wife, Tammy, and his daughters. He says that’s when they really get to know each other, proudly adding, "I’m part of their lives."