Shoe shiner gives $200K to hospital

• Tweet

PITTSBURGH, Feb. 21 (UPI) -- A shoe-shiner working at a Pittsburgh children's hospital has donated more than $200,000 worth of tips to the facility during the past 32 years.

Albert Lexie, who has been shining shoes at the Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh since 1981, said customers have been generous with their tips for the $5 shoe-shines, WTAE-TV, Pittsburgh, reported Thursday.

"Most of them give $6, some of them give $7," Lexie said.

Lexie said he has been donating all of his tips to the hospital, totaling more than $200,000 during the past 32 years.

Dr. Joseph Carcillo said the money goes toward the care of sick children whose parents can't afford medical care on their own.

"I think he does it because he loves the kids," Dr. Joseph Carcillo said. "He's donated over a third of his lifetime salary to the Children's Hospital Free Care Fund."

The money goes to parents of sick children who can't afford to pay medical costs.

"He's a philanthropist, is what he is," Carcillo said. "He's an entrepreneur."