From Hidden Brain Media, I'm Shankar Vedantam.

This is my unsung hero, stories where one person reached out to help another in a time of need.

I would like to thank my unsung hero.

I do not know her.

He just pulled up a chair and we talked.

I'd say for about...

I can't even express to you how much you've changed my life.

Today's story comes from Lavan Shaftsma.

Recently, Lavan was in downtown Chicago visiting from Michigan.

She had some extra time before an appointment, so she decided to stroll through

the city. She stopped for breakfast and then eventually settled down on a bench in Millennium Park.

After a while, she got up to go, and sometime later, she realized her purse was missing. It held

her ID, credit cards, medications, car keys, and hundreds of dollars in cash.

Frantically, Laveon began retracing her steps over and over again.

After about an hour, I found myself right in front of the Millennium Park gift shop.

And I don't know why but I decided to

walk in and just see if maybe someone had turned in my purse so I went into the gift shop and I went up

to the cashier and I said by any chance has anyone turned in a black purse? Her eyes got really big and she said,

wait a minute, is that yours? And at that moment, all of the tears and sobs came out,

all of my anxiety came out and she said, wow, do I have a story for you?

She said two women had come into the gift store with a black purse. They had seen it on a

park bench, but as they were walking over, they noticed a man looking inside of it, and they immediately

...