BALTIMORE — "I’ve never been successful in any attempts to grow facial hair whatsoever."
If there was ever a time for Chandler Morse to attempt to grow a mustache, and do it successfully, being under quarantine for months on end was it.
When the hair finally grew in, he had to share his accomplishment.
"So I took a picture of my mustache and texted it to my brother who lives in Seattle and he was immediately like 'Oak-aley doke-aly neighbor, hidey-ho. You look exactly like Ned Flanders,'" Morse said.
Morse embraced it to the point of finding clothes in his closet that matched the iconic character from the Simpsons, dressing up as Ned Flanders and snapping a photo.
"The response was pretty hilarious and lots of people were like hey are you taking requests?"
The mustache, or Mors-ache, project took off. Morse posed as famous actors and characters with mustaches like Ron Burgandy from Anchorman, comedian Jeff Foxworthy, the late Jeopardy! host Alex Trebek, the Swedish Chef from the Muppets and the infamous Tiger King.
But it was when a friend asked him to dress up like the Lorax from Dr. Seuss that the project went from fun to fundraiser.
"A couple of days later he texted me and said $50 to a charity of your choice if you can pull off the Lorax and I said challenge accepted."
Morse chose GEDCO, which provides free housing and supportive services to seniors and the homeless along the York Road Corridor in North Baltimore. GEDCO CARES runs a food pantry out of St. Mary of the Assumption church off York Road.
"We’ve had a huge increase in the number of people coming for assistance, so we are giving out probably twice as much food as we use to," said Rachael Neill, the director of community services for GEDCO. "And we’re allowing people to come more often also."
Morse kept the spirit of giving going when friends encouraged him to make a calendar of his photos of famous mustaches. He made the calendar, sold out twice, and raised $900 for GEDCO CARES' food pantry.
"It feels really good to help them out and they could use all the help they can get," he said.
"This is going to broaden the awareness hopefully and keep things going for us so I’m really thankful to him," said Neill.
Morse says he'll continue to post photos of him imitating famous people with mustaches and may do another calendar. To see his photos, check out his Instagram page @fortydollaryoda
GEDCO CARES takes food donations Monday-Thursday from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. and Saturdays 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at St. Mary of the Assumption church, 5502 York Road in Baltimore. You can also make a monetary donation by clicking here.
