Larkin’s mother Julia Fulk said that they knew ahead of his birthday that it could not be a normal one. She said that he is currently in the most intense part of his treatment since he was diagnosed in September, and so is very immunocompromised.
The parade was largely organized by Casey Tingley, who said that he lives down the street from the Fulks, though he added that he is not close with the family.
Fulk said that she posted on Facebook asking for a small birthday drive-thru, and that it took off from there, especially when the call was amplified by Tingley.
He said that he had previously organized a drive-thru birthday event, so when he saw that Larkin’s mother wanted to hold one for her son, he put the call out for people to respond.
The call on social media took off, with more than 1,300 shares, Tingley said.
Fulk said that Tingley also shared the event on the Facebook page for his nonprofit Ohio Hope Builders, which had over 1,900 shares.
When the parade began, Fulk said that they live close enough to the school that they could hear when all the vehicles started up.
Larkin’s favorite, she said, were all the motorcycles.
A video of the event posted by Tingley showed hundreds of vehicles pass by, including many motorcycles, police cruisers, ambulances, fire trucks, tow trucks, cherry picker vehicles, several semi trucks, one cement mixer, dump trucks, many historic vehicles, and just as many regular passenger vehicles.
In all, Tingley said they had 337 vehicles join in, as well as about 170 motorcycles.
There were about twice as many vehicles as they expected, Tingley said.
Of the people who came, 90% of those who drove by were strangers, coming from as far away as Columbus and Piqua, Fulk said.
One familiar face was one of Larkin’s nurses who come with her kids and brought the boy baseball cards.
“We all cried from beginning to end,” she said, later saying, “Thank you to everyone, I can’t believe the support and turnout for Larkin.”
“It was not normal, it was better than normal,” she said.
“It hits your heart man, sick kids. It hits you in the heart,” Tingley said, adding that he just wanted to make the day special for Larkin and his family.
“We should take care each other, love each other,” he said.
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