Lifestyle
Baby Used in Popular Meme Has Grown into His Success
When Sammy Griner was almost one-year-old he grabbed a fist full of sand and tried to eat it. During his moment of curiosity, his mom snapped a photo with his face appearing determined and his hand clenched in victory. After she loaded the picture to photo-sharing site Flickr, someone thought it was funny and decided to make a popular meme out of it.
Since 2007, Sammy has been the face of “Success Kid.” People write funny captions expressing some form of success to accompany his photo and it spreads like wildfire throughout the internet.
His parents have enjoyed the harmless fun, and his father, Justin Griner, even has a tattoo of his son in the iconic pose. However, now that Sammy is 9-years-old, his internet fame morphed into something more important to the family.
Justin received a kidney transplant one year ago, and while the surgery was covered by insurance, the vital medication to prevent rejection was not. The Griners were rightfully worried, but after starting a GoFundMe campaign using the meme’s popularity, they were able to raise $100,000.
KHOU wrote that Justin joked, “Now I have to buy [Sammy] everything he wants because I owe it to him. He’ll always have that over me: ‘Well dad, remember I did save your life.'”
