How one man fed St. Louis from a street corner after the tornado

Liz Rymarev for The St. Louis Post Dispatch

It was one of the first cold days in October. A woman came to the corner of Ashland and North Newstead avenues. She was wearing a beanie and scarf, but her jacket was light and she was shivering.

Larry Gray saw her coming. He walked her to a pile of donated clothing and sifted through. She picked out a new pair of shoes and a jacket. He gave her a gallon Ziploc of trail mix, cheese sticks and snacks.

The woman, Kanita Tate, lives in vacant schools and buildings. She comes to Gray when she needs food or hits a low point.

“Without Larry, I wouldn’t eat,” Tate said.

The day after the May tornado tore through St. Louis, Gray set up a grill at Ashland and Newstead, and started serving food to his neighbors. He's been there every day ever since. Now, he's serving anybody who's hungry.

He lives across from the stand on Newstead. Around him, houses are still ripped apart and gutted, bricks spilling onto the street. But Gray has slowly turned the corner into a mismatched conglomeration of tents, tables, grills and food trailers that, for seven months, have fed and clothed hundreds — friends, friends-of-friends, neighbors, homeless people and dozens and dozens of tornado victims.

As word spread and people began to drop off food, clothing and bigger cooking equipment, Gray formed a new mission: Create a space for everyone.

“God looked down on me, even though my past was reckless,” Gray said. “He must’ve saw something good in me. He chose me to do this, put this in my hand. So I’m going to keep it going as long as people keep bringing me stuff to do it.”

Donations come from as far as St. Charles County and as close as Gray’s own neighbors, who grew up in north St. Louis and are proud to see his work.

Gray takes whatever comes to him and cooks it up — hot dogs and hamburgers, mac-and-cheese, green beans, sandwiches, even whole chickens, sometimes. There's a table full of winter coats, beanies, shoes and underwear, plus a shed with a heater.

And when night creeps in and it gets cold, people toss wood into the barrels, Gray splashes on lighter fluid and the fire’s orange glow dances across the lot.

“I come to Larry to eat and survive,” said Charles Smith, a regular at the stand whose house was destroyed by the tornado.

Lessons from the past

Gray grew up moving around north St. Louis.

But every summer as a boy he was sent off to his grandparent’s farm in Sikeston, Missouri, about 45 minutes south of Cape Girardeau.

He remembers the never-ending fields of soybean, corn and cotton. And he remembers everything his grandparents taught him about living in the country.

His grandmother, Rosemary Hughes, would always cook a little extra in case someone stopped by and they hadn’t eaten.

They hunted rabbits, squirrels and pigeons. Sometimes the river behind his grandmother’s house would flood and overflow into the fields. When the waters receded, hundreds of fish would be left behind for Gray to collect, and his family and neighbors would be fed for weeks.

He dropped out of school in 10th grade, got into trouble — he wouldn't say exactly what kind — and was sent to a correctional center.

When Gray was 29, he was arrested for promoting prostitution. He took a plea bargain in 1988 and served five years in prison.

He recalls talking to a man he met at a pool hall a few years ago who told him there were some people in the neighborhood talking about Gray’s past. And that made Gray insecure.

But Gray said the man offered a different perspective:

“You ought to feel good about it,” the man told him. “They’re saying what you used to do. They’re not saying that you’re doing it now.”

Gray, now 67, said he is open about his past with people who bring him donations.

And they either aren’t concerned about it, or don't share their concerns, he said.

To Gray, the May tornado was like the flooding river.

He turned on his survival skills and used what he knew about making something out of nothing to feed himself and his neighbors.

A neighborhood torn apart

The day the tornado hit, Gray was with his friend Garfield Lacy tuckpointing Gray’s house. Lacy left to get mortar from his house on Newstead, a few blocks away, and Gray went to his car to grab supplies.

The sky darkened. Gray looked down Ashland and saw the tornado turn. He jumped back into his car.

He tried to watch through his windshield, but dirt and mud splashed across.

The whole thing was over in about three minutes, he said. His car stopped shaking and he stepped outside.

“It looked like a war zone,” Gray said. Bricks were everywhere, power lines down and cars battered. He walked through his neighborhood filming videos.

The streets of his childhood were unrecognizable.

At his house, the corners of his roof broke off, the windows were shattered, the electricity gone.

Down the street, the tornado destroyed Lacy's house — right when he stepped inside. He was buried under the rubble for five hours.

What resulted was five broken ribs, a fractured collarbone, spinal cord damage, kidney failure and bruises all over his body.

The house on Newstead was in Lacy’s family for 85 years.

“It’s heartbreaking,” Lacy said. “When it’s finally your turn, then the wind comes through and knocks it all down — it’s gone.”

Lacy is now homeless. He sometimes stays with family members and sometimes in a tent at the food stand.

Every day, he’ll grab a bowl of food from Gray and eat while helping with odd jobs around the lot: collecting fire wood, helping people charge their phone with a generator and setting bricks down on the dirt courtyard so it doesn’t get muddy.

Friendship through food

All kinds of people have come by to help out.

Danny Williams, a retiree who lives in the neighborhood, cooks food and helps serve almost every day.

David and Laura Butsch, who have lived in a hotel since the tornado hit their Central West End home, raided their pantry when they heard about Gray's table. They dropped off Cheez-its and canned food.

“There’s so many of us (tornado victims), all in an isolated part of the city, we’ve been reaching out to each other since it happened … we’re all just pitching in,” Laura Butsch said.

Charron Mathis, who owns and runs a taco food truck, saw Gray serving one day after the tornado, and decided he needed to help. He pulled his food trailer next to Gray on Ashland, and for a month this summer, he cooked every day alongside Gray. They fed close to 200 people a day.

“The need was just so great,” Mathis said. “I wasn’t able to sleep good, not knowing that I could have done something.”

Mathis wasn’t working then. Honestly, he said, he was struggling, too. The taco truck wasn't doing well. He was behind on his own mortgage payments.

Now, sometimes he, his girlfriend and her 2-year-old daughter sleep next to the lot in Mathis’ brother’s car.

“People like us,” Gray said, “we don’t have a whole lot, but we try to do what we can for our friends, and other people too.”

Future of the stand

Now Gray is trying to get organized: He has created a nonprofit organization, Larry's Free Food Corner. He hopes to make a salary soon, through the nonprofit. And he plans to buy a building for operations — the lot at Ashland and Newstead isn't his, and the owner has stopped responding to Gray's requests to buy the land, Gray said.

If he needs city permits, he'll get them, he said.

In five years, he hopes to be able to provide the same free food that started it all, along with programs like drug counseling.

But on most days, he's just handling each moment as it comes.

One November day, two gunshots rang out down Ashland. Gray was working on a wall of hot dog buns when a 2-year-old pit bull named Patches ran in front of the food trailer and spun around in circles.

Blood dripped down his neck, staining his white fur.

Avian Battles was scrambling behind the dog, trying to catch him. “They shot Patches,” said Battles, a sometimes volunteer. “I tried to go over there and get him, but it was too late.”

Patches had run over to two men walking their own dog, Battles explained. But instead of being met with a pat on the head, he was shot.

The dog shivered in fear.

Gray wiped his face with his hands, sat down on a lawn chair, pulled Patches in front of him, and began to unravel a disposable diaper from a donation bag. He wrapped it around the dog's neck, over the wound and closed the tabs.

“It’s not a time to be at odds with each other,” Gray said. “Now is the time to try to come together and see how we can make this stuff work, and figure out solutions.”

He gave Patches one final pat, stood up and turned toward the line of people, waiting to be fed.