5-year-old boy sends $1 allowance to help save UAB football

DUBLIN, Ohio — A 5-year-old Ohio boy hoping to save the scuttled football program at the University of Alabama at Birmingham thought more cash might be the solution, so he sent his entire allowance — a $1 bill — with a handwritten note of support.

“I love Ohio State, but I think you should have football too. Here is one dollar to help!” Bennett Williams of suburban Dublin, Ohio, wrote in the note to UAB.

He had decided he liked UAB after seeing its dragon logo and hoped to go to a game, but was very disappointed to learn the school is eliminating football to cut costs, his parents told The Columbus Dispatch. When the boy asked if contributing his allowance might help, his parents responded with optimism rather than rubbing in the financial realities of a football program that costs tens of millions of dollars.

“We said, ‘Sure. We can try,” said his mother, Amanda Williams. “It’s hard as parents to tell your child that it’s not possible.”

She hoped it would be a comforting gesture for people connected to UAB’s football program. And it was.

Assistant athletic director Reid Adair told the family that Bennett’s kindness touched the beleaguered athletics staff, which is framing the letter and the dollar.

The Blazers sent back a football and other gear for Bennett, but it was the accompanying letter that caught his attention, his mother said.

“In the letter, they told him he was their No. 1 fan,” she said. “And he was most excited about that.”