The gesture made Thomas Karna feel extremely special.
A Wisconsin community rallied together to throw a birthday bash for a 10-year-old boy with autism after only three friends RSVP’d to his birthday party.
Thomas Karna’s parents sent out 75 invitations to his 10th birthday party, but when only a handful of those invited responded, a family friend stepped in.
Knowing that Thomas likes motorcycles, Stephanie Lovejoy made a Facebook event, reaching out to local bikers.
“We told our friend Stephanie about it and she posted it on Facebook and apparently it went viral from there,” Alan Karna, Thomas’ dad, told InsideEdition.com.
They knew the event invite was reaching tons of people, but they never expected the turnout for Thomas’ party Sunday. Dozens of bikers showed up to celebrate the 10-year-old’s birthday with him at Slinger Community Park.
“We were going to go out a little bit early and we were going to do a little bit of a photo shoot beforehand but even though we got there 20 minutes early, there was still a huge crowd of people there already,” Karna said.
"And they were still coming," Thomas added.
Tons of bikers greeted Thomas and wished him a happy birthday.
"When the fellow biker calls, we just show up," Tammy Rosman, a biker who attended the event, told Fox 6.
Karna said the turnout was overwhelming. Thomas got to ride on his dad’s bike alongside all of his supporters as well.
Many of the attendees even gave the 10-year-old gifts and donated to Autism Speaks and to CDH International, as Thomas also has Congenital Diaphragmatic Hernia.
Karna said every kid deserves to feel special, and Thomas clearly did.
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