The people of Milford are proving again that when one of their own is in need, they show up.
Main Street Market will host a community fundraiser event complete with music, food and activities on Saturday, June 14, to support 21-year-old Anthony Roth in his cancer battle.
Anthony’s father, Orlando, works at Main Street Market. Knowing the Roth family is facing many expenses from medical bills to the cost of traveling back and forth from Omaha, store owner Craig Bontrager thought a community fundraiser event would be a way to support them.
The Roth family moved from Pennsylvania to Milford, Orlando’s hometown, in 2011. Anthony and his siblings attended Milford Public Schools for a couple of years before their mother, Toni, began teaching at Lincoln Christian. They transferred there and Anthony graduated in 2022.
Anthony then attended Southeast Community College in Milford and studied construction technology. He was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma in the fall of 2023, which was his second year of college. The people surrounding him in Milford supported him as he completed his studies.
He initially planned to go to a university and get a four-year degree in construction management. However, over the course of his life and illness, he realized he wants to be a pastor, Toni said. He is now an online seminary student at the Midwest Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City and working toward a Master’s degree in divinity.
He finished his first round of treatment during the spring of 2024 and entered remission, but his Hodgkin’s lymphoma reoccurred last fall.
Anthony completed a second round of chemotherapy and is scheduled for a stem cell transplant at the University of Nebraska Medical Center starting on June 20. The transplant will help his body re-learn to produce healthy cells.
Toni said Anthony loves being athletic and continues to play golf, disc golf and stay active with his brothers and friends despite his health struggles.
“He loves people; he’s a natural shepherd,” she said. “He loves his brothers, and he’s an amazingly resilient kid. He has such a positive attitude toward all of this.”
To learn more about Anthony’s journey or donate to the family, go to his CaringBridge site at https://bit.ly/4jFg99Y.
Toni said Anthony has treatments and will be preparing for the transplant on the day of the fundraiser event in Milford, but he and the family hope to be there for part of the day. The Roths said they are deeply grateful for all of the support they have received since Anthony’s diagnosis and could not have made it without their friends, family and faith.
“It's really hard to express how grateful we are,” Orlando said. “We've just had so much support through this whole thing that I'm without words, really.”
The event will be from 4 – 8 p.m. at Main Street Market, at 115 U.S. Highway 6.
Free-will donations will be accepted at the event, which will begin with a petting zoo and kids’ activities, such as flower arranging. The petting zoo will feature animals owned by community members including llamas, goats, puppies and chickens.
From 4:30 – 5:30 p.m., there will be live music from the Depot Boys.
A barbecue dinner from Burkey’s Barbecue will start at 5 p.m. Some local churches donated supplies and food for the meal. Pastor Tim Springer with Milford Mennonite Church said the church wanted to donate to the cause so that all the income generated at the event can go directly to the Roth family.
Springer said he is excited to see the community pull together to help their own for this event.
“Anytime you can help anybody that definitely is in need and we can do that as a community, I think it is just a win-win situation,” he said. “If we can come together as a community, it's going to do a lot for us in the future where we're willing to help, we're willing to ask for help and having each other's back in those times.”
There will be a live auction at 5:30 p.m. The market has donated items, such as its mercantile goods and its popular whoopie pies, and collected donations from community members for the auction. The money raised at the auction will also go to the Roth family.
At 6 p.m., the B-Street Band will perform.
“I always enjoy playing music for people,” Bontrager, the band’s drummer, said. “I really enjoy playing up there and hosting, and I like to see people enjoying their time, socializing, seeing people get together, sit at a picnic table and catch up with somebody they haven't seen in a while. They’re enjoying their sandwich and you can see a smile on their face when they're listening to a song they used to know.”
Upon opening Main Street Market, Bontrager said he and his family knew they wanted to give back to the community and help bring people together with events like this.
“When someone in the community is hurting a little bit or something, we get something like this together,” Bontrager said. I’ve heard of people coming from a long way away for this, so I think it’ll be well supported.”
