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Loren Krueger of LeRoy, a small Minnesota town on the Iowa border, died last year at 94, leaving behind a plain, white house on Main Street and $3 million in the bank.
Townsfolk knew the retired farmer and World War II vet was frugal. Now they know he was rich and generous.
"Nobody knew he had that kind of money," LeRoy resident LaRae Eastvold told KARE.
Since Krueger's death, checks from his estate have arrived at organizations all over town. The LeRoy Senior Center -- which previously operated on $600 a year, a budget so meager staff charged seniors for coffee -- received $220,000.
The fire department and ambulance service also each received $220,000. The former hopes to replace a fire truck, while the ambulance service constructed overnight facilities for on-call EMTs.
Krueger willed his church, St. Patrick's Catholic Church, $1 million.
Apparently unbound by religious partisanship, Krueger also left more than $400,000 each to Bethany Bible Church; the LeRoy Evangelical Lutheran Church, which fixed its bell tower and will use the rest of the money to make the church more handicapped accessible; and First Presbyterian Church, whose congregants used some of the money to fix a leaky roof.
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While Krueger might have known how much good his small-town neighbors could do with his money, he might not have imagined they would pay it forward.The churches all have donated a portion of their windfall to build a new kitchen at the town's assisted-living facility, and the senior center wrote a check toward a new school playground.
The seniors also gave $10,000 to Grace Christian Church, the only church in town that sprang up after Krueger wrote his will; and are combining funds with the Lutheran church to fix the town swimming pool.
To read more, go to KARE.
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