Memories of great-grandfather keep West Leechburg boy running annual lemonade stand to fight Alzheimer’s

“Brody’s Lemonade Stand’ marks 11th year.

By BRIAN C. RITTMEYER
TribLive

Brody Toy barely knew his great-grandfather, but he’ll never forget him.

Joseph M. Kish lived with Alzheimer’s disease for a decade before he died from it at the age of 92 in 2015.

An Army veteran, he served in World War II in New Guinea, the Philippines and Australia. The West Leechburg native then made his home in Gilpin for 65 years, working as a bricklayer and plasterer before working at NUMEC in Parks Township, retiring in 1973.

Toward the end, Kish’s entire family took care of him — even Brody, who was just a “teeny tiny toddler,” said his mom, Lisa Richards.

Brody would take his great-grandfather’s hand and help walk him to bed.

“I still do remember him, and miss him,” said Brody, who is 14 and about 6 feet tall.

In 2016, the year after his great grandfather’s death when Brody was just 3 years old, he started a lemonade stand to raise money for Alzheimer’s research.

The stand staffed by Brody and his family entered its 11th year Saturday, set up outside Romeo’s Tire Center in Leechburg.

They hold the stand one day, once a year in June, which is Alzheimer’s and Brain Awareness Month.

“I’m just a boy with a lemonade stand and a dream of a world without Alzheimer’s,” said Brody, who will be a freshman this fall at Leechburg High School.

Despite gray skies and a few sprinkles, the stand had a steady stream of customers. They opened at noon and, by 3:30 p.m., had gone through 200 cups of lemonade. They had sold out of the potato chips made by Richards’s brother, B.J. Creak, and her grandmother Helen’s chocolate chip cookies. The ranch-seasoned oyster crackers that Brody makes were also popular.

“It’s one of the best things we have going in Leechburg — the best oyster crackers you can buy,” said Joe Fleschow, of Leechburg.

In addition to straight lemonade, they also had blue raspberry, watermelon, cotton candy and purple berry — purple being the official color of the global Alzheimer’s movement.

There’s a new flavor every year, and this year it was cherry fireworks, made with cherry Pop Rocks candy. That’s the flavor Fleschow got.

“It’s phenomenal,” he said. “It’s really, really good — like a firework it goes ‘Boom!’ ” In its first year, set up at their West Leechburg home, the stand raised $300.

Last year it took in $4,000, and over 10 years it has raised more than $30,000, Richards said.

Their best year was 2020, during the covid-19 pandemic, when they raised $8,000.

“Everybody wanted out of their house,” she said.

The money raised goes toward their team, Joe’s Alz Starz, in the Beaver & Butler Walk to End Alzheimer’s. This year’s walk will be Oct. 10 at North Boundary Park in Cranberry. Donations to Brody and his family’s team can be made online.

“We plan on doing this until there’s a cure for Alzheimer’s,” Brody said. “We don’t want people to have to deal with what we had to deal with.”