Retired—or at least semi-retired—real estate developer Michael Mungo had an idea. In his home town of Columbia, South Carolina, roughly 3,000 people were waiting to get into public housing. At least that many houses were in violation of housing codes; about 450 of those houses were condemned. Mungo proposed this:

Home builders would renovate two condemned houses a year, at cost. The houses would be given to people on the wait list if they showed they could take care of them. The City would waive regulatory fees. Mungo himself would donate resources to the project.

It was a clear example of Michael Mungo's creativity, drive, and commitment to those who hadn't been as successful as he was. He'd grown up poor—his widowed mother had separated him and his six siblings to weather the Depression. But as an adult he made a substantial amount of money in building and selling homes.

Remembering his own past, Mungo empathized with people who barely had enough money to live on. He built the Michael J. Mungo Foundation to support them. He endowed hundreds of scholarships for disadvantaged youth. He established a Distinguished Professor of the Year Award for the University of South Carolina (where he was a trustee) to encourage education. He helped to establish the Statewide Homes Foundation to develop homes in the African-American community. And he was a founding member of the Harvest Hope Food Bank. Mungo accomplished most of this after having contributed in a major way to the development of Columbia and its suburbs.

Said a close friend, "He had a deep feeling for those who worried about where their next meal was coming from, where they would sleep that night. He was really very concerned about people's basic needs."

Mungo said that he liked family, friends, fishing, nice clothes, great food, and a good book. He wasn't concerned about publicity for himself, just for his causes. He summed up his priorities this way:

"I want to help hungry people. What is it going to take to meet this need right now?"

Update: Michael Mungo died in April of 2010.