An incredible story unfolded in a small Massachusetts town when Chabad rabbis received a call from a nursing home informing them of the death of a resident, a 96-year-old special needs man who had no relatives or friends to assist with his burial.

Chabad emissaries immediately sprang into action, providing the meis with a proper tahara and gathering a minyan to escort him on his final journey. While the nursing home had provided them with his English name and told Chabad of a certain plot where he was supposedly to be buried, they had no way of knowing what jis Hebrew name was; still, they forged on in their holy mission.

Upon bringing the mitah to the cemetery, they found a plot with a headstone divided into three sections – one for a father, named Herschel who passed away in 1989, one for a mother, who passed away in 1973, and a third section for “our beloved son.”

The headstone stated his Hebrew name, Kalman, and that he was born in 1925 but had no passing date. It became clear to the Chabad shluchim that the parents of this man had decades ago bought a plot for their special needs son, knowing that if not for their proactiveness he might not ever be zoche to kever yisroel.

The Chabad shluchim, touched by the parents incredible thoughtfulness for their son, said kaddish for him and were able to make a kel malei rachamim using the deceased man’s full name, thanks to a small act of love by his parents some 50 years ago.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)