off the field that's a hit with a young boy recovering from a dog attack. >> when he wanted to do that for him, it was huge. >> here's nbc bay area's garvin thomas. >> thank you so much for joining us. for the next 30 minutes, we'd love to treat you to a different type of newscast, one that focuses solely on the good things happening in the bay area and the good people who make them happen. and what better way to start than with an amazing gift. the person who got it is ron "mo" molina. for more than two decades, the ran the very successful chorale program at antioch high school. another way to measure it is what you'll see now. >> this is the bassist. >> reporter: how many measures of music does it take? to take the measure of a man's life? ♪ those rehearsing for a special concert inside antioch high school's bead auditorium are soon to find out. >> come on, crescendo, crescendo! >> reporter: the life in question not one of theirs but the one thing they all have in common. learning music and life from ron "mo" molina. >> i've always said that if i could be anyone, that i want to be just like him. >> reporter: for 27 years, music has been cool at antioch because music was mo. he would regularly field a concert choir of more than 200 singers. the elite among them, the music masters, toured the world, winning competition after competition, performing hundreds of times each year. mo, all the while, not just telling his kids they were family, but showing it. >> he was my hero. he was who i wanted to be. >> reporter: mo often told anyone who would listen, he never wanted another job. he would never quit. unfortunately, his body started to last christmas. >> my body just said, fine, if you're not going to do it on your own, i guess we'll do it for you. to the point where i fell on the floor and couldn't get up. >> reporter: liver disease is what the doctors said. mo's full-time job was now to get healthy, leaving no time for his other one. >> ultimately, the decision i made was to step down. >> reporter: the moment mo stopped working, though, was when a handful of his former students started. >> we've got to plan something. >> reporter: that something was this past saturday, and it was to be a surprise. for months, they had rehearsed and planned any of mo's former music masters who wanted to perform were welcome. >> come on in. >> reporter: they got mo to the hall by telling him it was a regular music masters winter concert. >> you'll get to see it. we'll get things going. >> reporter: but when old friends greeted him at the door. >> hey, guys. >> reporter: and more filled the seats -- ♪ ♪ a familiar place >> reporter: mo began to realize there was nothing regularly about this event. ♪ we wish you a merry christmas ♪ >> reporter: still it wasn't until his old students flooded the aisles and filled the stage that the same thing happened to his heart. >> look at them. >> reporter: it is one thing to be told that your life mattered. to be told that you made a difference in this world. >> holy mackerel. >> reporter: it is quite another to have 150 voices deliver that message in perfect harmony. ♪ i love you >> just unbelievable to look up and see them all. >> reporter: the only thing better would be to lead those voices, perhaps for the last time. ♪ which is just what mo did. >> i love you guys. [ cheers and plauz ] >> our next story is technically a follow-up. it's about a personal quest sparked by world-changing event, the vietnam war. it was four years ago that i first did a story about kim delavat and her search for the man that saved her life as a little girl. if that sounds like a long time, it's not. considering just how long kim has been looking for answers, one she just recently found. >> reporter: a single picture has the power we all know to tell the story of a moment in time. but put two together, and you just might see the story of an entire lifetime. with these two, kim delavat's lifetime. >> when i think about the beginning, it seems like just eons ago now. >> reporter: the first photograph is of kim as a young girl with her mother and relatives on an apartment balcony in saigon in 1975. not long before the city fell and kim, without her mother, would be among the last to flee. kim was adopted by a family in florida. her childhood years spent desperately not wanting to be different. but her hair, her skin, her eyes made that job impossible. >> it was really hard on me growing up because i just dreaded talking about where i was born. >> reporter: it all changed, though, one night in 1992 when kim sat in a broadway theater with her now husband, peter. the show was "miss saigon," and the story of war tearing apart mother and child stirred something inside kim. >> as soon as the play was over, i remember telling peter, who was my boyfriend at the time, we need to go back to vietnam. it's time. >> reporter: two years later following a handwritten map, kim found her family and began unearthing her story. she learned her mother was supposed to escape with her but went first to say good-bye to relatives and missed the flight. she died six years later in a refugee camp one day before she was to immigrate to the united states. it was then she also first heard the name jim smith, the american she was told was instrumental in getting her on that plane that got her out of the country. but who jim smith was, why he did what he did, and what became of him remained a mystery. for 18 years, kim and her husband searched for jim smith following dozens of promising leads, always coming up empty. until, that is, kim's adoptive father found a dusty folder in an attic. >> on this page -- >> reporter: with an address that proved to be the clue that led to a grave site in florida where jim smith had been buried in 1980. >> my dream came true after all these years, after 18 years, of trying to find mr. smith, finding jim smith, we had. >> reporter: kim learned that jim smith was a civilian contractor in vietnam. her mother, his house cleaner. they actually lived in his apartment, the one with the balcony on which this picture was taken, the one kim was able to return to recently with her son. but not all successful searches are satisfying ones. kim also wanted to find jim smith's relatives to thank them and learn more about the man. but jim's one son, for reasons not entirely clear, has declined to meet with kim. still, kim is happy to have learned what she did. for one can't know how long a journey has been unless they know where it started. from a story that spans the world to one that grew right in our backyard, literally. we're talking about a giant sequoia tree planted by legendary natural list john muir more than 100 years ago on his property in martinez. the land is now a national historic site. the tree, well, it's in trouble. and one man is leading the charge to save it. >> reporter: at the intersection of elhambra avenue and highway 4 in martinez, the john muir national historic site is a wonderful place in terms of ease of access. it is a terrible place, though, to grow a sequoia. this part of the east bay is just too hot and too dry. >> yeah, i think it's probably a combination of all those, yeah, environment, soil. >> reporter: it's why when keith paar came to work here four years ago, he wasn't surprised to learn this 130-year-old 80-foot giant sequoia, like most others in the region, was not doing well. >> it's done okay. it's made it thus far from 1880 to the present, but it does have a disease. and everybody -- we all knew it. >> reporter: but this, of course, was not just any other tree. it was planted here by famed naturalist john muir in the 1880s. in this 1885 photograph, you see the tree, protected by a wooden age, planted in a prominent spot on the property for all to see. >> he could have planted it anywhere. he planted it at the intersection of two farm roads. >> reporter: keith soon realized the only way to save this tree would be to clone it. but that's notoriously difficult with giant sequoias. in fact, there may be only one person in the world capable of doing it. >> all the others have failed. >> reporter: good thing, then, that david millarch agreed to tree. he runs the archangel ancient tree archive in michigan dedicated preserving old growth and historic trees. he told us via skype that he jumped at the chance to work on a tree that muir himself had touched. in fact, he'd do it for free. >> you can almost sense like a sacredness to these trees because, you know, john muir walked thousands of miles. he walked all over. why did he pick that one tree to bring there to plant it by his home that witnessed his life and times? >> reporter: so much like he does with other park trees, keith climbed the sequoia with a saw and a pair of pruning shears. except instead of cutting away the dead parts, he sought out the newest growth, clipped it, and overnight it had ed it to m. there it was treated not only with tlc but hormones to stimulate growth. in fact, keith heard that roots have indeed started to grow, and john muir's tree will live on, in a way. and even if the current sequoia hangs on for many more years and keith never sees it replaced with a copy, he's happy knowing he played a part not just in preserving history but keeping it alive. >> i do take a great sense of pride in being able to at least start the project, you know, but maybe my daughter will someday come back to the john muir site and see this tree being planted that her dad helped save in a way. conventional wisdom tells you to keep some distance between your personal and professional life. but one very smart woman is doing the exact opposite. >> it's a constant struggle for physicians to find what people refer to as a work/life balance. >> this oakland pediatrician is literally bringing work into her home and wouldn't have it any other way. >> once i found out that i could do a charity organization, the first thing i thought was hunter. >> but first, a high school home run star hits it out of the park for a little boy. our "bay area proud" series is all about the good things people do, and this next story is no exception. it does, however, start with something bad. a 10-year-old boy mauled by a neighbor's dog back in august in antioch. hunter kilborn still has a long road to recovery ahead of him, but that road will be easier thanks to an unlikely source. >> reporter: if lucas halstead's dreams come true -- >> you feel that? that was it. >> reporter: -- someone is one day going to pay him a lot of money to do what he already loves doing. hitting and catching a baseball. still, what makes this baseball standout stand out even more is how he is choosing to give long before he ever gets. lucas is a star player on the monta vista high school baseball team. so good, in fact, he was one of a handful of young players from around the world chosen to participate earlier this year in the elite power showcase in miami. >> just such a shock. it was awesome. it was the coolest thing ever. >> reporter: one part of the event, a home run derby with a generous twist. with each home run hit, money raised for the charity of the player's choice. and while many chose large, well-known organizations, ones that help thousands of kids, lucas was interested in helping just one. >> once i found out that i could do a charity organization, the first thing i thought was hunter, help him out with medical costs that he has to pay for. >> reporter: lucas first heard about hunter kilborn like the rest of us, on the evening news. hunter had been playing at a friend's home in antioch when that neighbor's two dogs attacked him. the injuries severe, the scars long-lasting. but then lucas earn wilearned h soon to have another connection. his mom, kelly, was to be hunter's fourth grade teacher at mo morello elementary. over the past few months lucas got to know hunter. >> nothing's going to hold him back. >> reporter: and hunter got to know lucas. >> he's a tall, big guy. nice as well. >> representing california, here is lucas halstead. >> reporter: so if big league scouts watching him hit in a major league park weren't enough pressure, lucas wanted to hit out at least a few for hunter. >> there it is. >> reporter: which is just what he did. >> it's out of here! >> i get emotional about it all the time when i really think about it, you know. yeah, like, he's my baby. he's my firstborn. when someone -- you know, and he wanted to do that for him, it was huge. >> reporter: in the end, though, lucas didn't just raise $2,000 for hunter, he gained a whole new perspective for himself. >> i can just promise you that i will never play another game of baseball without thinking that it's going to be my last game, because it could end like that. >> raising your own kids is hard enough. now add 90 foster kids into the mix. >> i sometimes feel that god just put me here, really, to take care of the kids that don't have love in their life. >> but claudia is doing more than just taking care of them in her home. see what she is doing once they leave. and an oakland pediatrician gives bedside manner a whole new meaning. that bay area proud story when we come back. lucky charms! ♪ [ birds chirping, twinkling noises ] you're always after me lucky charms! they're magically delicious! can help your kids' school get extra stuff. they're the only cereals with box tops for education. you can raise money for your kids' school. look for this logo. only on big g cereals. you can make a difference. every cereal box counts. many people consider a doctor who makes house calls as the epitome of personal service. but dr. caroline hastings, a pediatric hematologist and oncologist at children's hospital oakland may have you rethinking that. she is a doctor, wife, mother who is turning the idea of work/life balance on its head with beautiful results. >> reporter: bringing work home from the job regardless of what you do is something most of us try to avoid. even more so when you're a doctor, like caroline hastings. >> it's a constant struggle for physicians to find what people refer to as a work/life balance because it is not only just time consuming, but it consumes us emotionally. and you just can't turn it off when you go home. >> and here's the drug for the transfer. >> reporter: what makes caroline special, though, is that she is a doctor who stopped trying to turn it off. instead, she invited it in. literally. >> i brought my family into my work and my work into my family. it was actually a lot easier for me, and it made more sense. and it was comfortable. >> i'm going to take some of this off. i'm so sorry. >> reporter: on this day, for example, after treating 10-year-old twins adddy and cassie hempel for a rare genetic disorder -- ♪ happy birthday to you >> reporter: -- she's treating them to a birthday party at her house. the party is here because the hempel family from reno is staying here. adddy, cassie, mom, chris, and dad, hugh, spending the week sleeping right off caroline's dining room. >> i've got the most amazing doctor in the world and the most beautiful friend at the same time. what else could you ask for? i mean, if you wanted a physician, you couldn't get anything better than this. >> i remember talking to you two. >> reporter: the hemplels, it turns out, sht the first out-of-town families caroline has housed over the years. her three teenage daughters have not only become used to the unique houseguest, they look forward to them. it is perhaps the main reason caroline chooses to erase almost every line between her personal and professional lives. >> i think it's enriched the life -- the lives of my children, and i feel like it's made me not only a better physician but a better mother, a better wife, a better friend. >> reporter: it's a work/life balance that may not work for everyone, but in this case, works beautifully. to be a foster parent, you have to have a big heart. but what claudia and roy espere have done for their 90 foster children goes well beyond love. their story when we come back. ♪ ♪ turn around ♪ every now and then i get a little bit hungry ♪ ♪ and there's nothing really good around ♪ ♪ turn around ♪ every now and then i get a little bit tired ♪ ♪ of living off the taste of the air ♪ ♪ turn around,arry ♪ finally, i have a manly chocolatey snack ♪ ♪ and fiber so my wife won't give me any more flack ♪ ♪ i finally found the right snack ♪ ♪ our final story tonight is about a pair of foster parents from novato. as you've probably guessed by now, if they're the subject of a "bay area proud" story, they're not your average foster parents. claudia and roy definitely are above average. so much so their commitment to foster children doesn't end even when they're no longer children. >> reporter: there is a home in novato that is bilingual. where mom, claudia, seamlessly blends fluent spanish -- she puts it at the end, right? >> reporter: and english with her kids. still there is a word that claudia seems to define differently than the rest of us, regardless of the language. that word is enough. let's start with claudia and husband, roy's, work as foster parents. >> a giraffe is born 6 feet tall. >> reporter: it began 16 years ago when a teenager asked just then 26-year-old claudia to be her foster home. she said yes. >> i don't know what i was thinking. >> reporter: what she didn't know was that she and roy would be great at it. that first foster child went on to graduate college, a rare feat for any foster kid. not, it turned out, though, for one of claudia and roy's foster kids. one of their many foster children. >> about 90 -- a little bit more than 90. >> volume. >> reporter: and here's where we get to enough. you would think caring so well for so many kids would be enough, but claudia was finding that some of her children, after aging out of the system, struggled to balance life and school, particularly those who made it to community colleges. >> she still have to figure out where they're going to live, pay rent, eat, you know, everything, you know. i started noticing that a lot of the kids that were in foster care that made it to a community college, that they were not finishing. >> reporter: so that is when claudia started thinking outside the box, or better yet, outside her home, to the one down the street. one that she now rents to former foster kids needing a place to stay in order to stay on the path of success that claudia and roy have started them. and if that sounds like a big expense, it is. it's why claudia is in the process of creating her own nonprofit now called movin' on up. she'd like to expand beyond the one home she's renting now and perhaps do still more, though clearly never enough. >> you know, there's a lot of times that i sit and i say why? like why did god pick me? i don't know. i'm not that religious. i'm catholic but i'm not, like, super crazy catholic, you know. i sometimes feel that god just put me here, really, to take care of the kids that don't have love in their life. >> thanks again for joining us for this "bay area proud" special. you can always catch new stories every tuesday and thursday in our 5:00 p.m. newscast. we've posted all our stories on our website. just go to nbcbayarea.com/bayareaproud. have a great night, and we'll see you next time. [ male announcer ] pillsbury grands biscuits. delicious, but say i press a few out flat, add some beef, sloppy joe sauce and cheese, fold it all up and boom! delicious unsloppy joes perfect for a school night. pillsbury grands biscuits. make dinner pop. so i should probably get the last roll... yeah but i practiced my bassoon. [ mom ] and i listened. [ brother ] i can do this. [ imitates robot ] everyone deserves ooey, gooey, pillsbury cinnamon rolls. make the weekend pop. everyone deserves ooey, gooey, pillsbury cinnamon rolls.

Related Keywords

Miami , Florida , United States , Vietnam , Republic Of , Oakland , California , Saigon , H Chíinh , Michigan , Spain , Spanish , American , Lucas Halstead , Cassie Hempel , Jim Smith , Caroline Hastings , Keith Paar , John Muir , Garvin Thomas , Ron Mo Molina ,