The weather outside is, as the song says, frightful — but that hasn’t stopped Butler County residents from attempting to lift the spirits or lend a helping hand to others.

Two stories in the past few days exemplify county residents making an effort to help others during the coronavirus pandemic.

On Friday, the Eagle printed a story about a group of students from St. Luke Lutheran School who traveled to Concordia Lutheran Ministries’ Lund Care Center to build snowmen to bring cheer to the seniors who reside there.

Although participants said the available snow at the site wasn’t ideal for building snowmen, it was the thought that counted — and their efforts were surely appreciated by the Concordia residents.

“Any time our residents and patients get the opportunity to see kids running around and having fun right outside their window, it’s a good day at Concordia,” said Frank Skrip, Concordia’s director of public relations.

Earlier last week, a tenant at an apartment building on Cecilia Street in Butler likely saved the life of a 36-year-old woman who is his neighbor.

On Tuesday night, the woman’s clothes caught on fire — officials are calling the fire “accidental,” and believe it was “caused by smoking materials” — while she was in the living room of her first-floor apartment.

An upstairs tenant, 39-year-old Earl Maier, heard his neighbor shouting for help, went down to inspect and saw fire through the front window of the woman’s apartment.

Maier got a plastic tub container, filled it with water several times and poured it on the fire, extinguishing it.

“He immediately jumped into action, and he did everything that we would recommend,” said Fire Chief Chris Switala, who called the burns the woman suffered “serious.”

In the case of both the St. Luke students looking to raise the spirits of Concordia residents in a cold, bleak month during a dispiriting period caused by COVID-19 as well as Maier, who came to the rescue of his neighbor, it’s great to see Butler County residents acting as Good Samaritans.

We could use more like them. It’s always a joy to be able to use this space to give recognition to people in the county who are doing things to make their communities proud.

— NCD