An answered phone call while with friends on a Saturday evening led Kannisha Foxx to frantically spin the wheels of her car around. As if to impede her hurried journey, the sky opened up with rain, water blurring her windshield as she pressed her foot to the accelerator anyway. Right before she reached the Interstate 55 offramp, a glance at heavy smoke confirmed dread: The Hernando, Mississippi, apartment where Foxx left her mom and handicapped daughter sleeping in was burning.
When she arrived, she discovered her daughter and mother barefoot in a nearby drainage ditch, neighbors having dragged them there for safety.
Her emotions, Foxx recalled, rocketed from panic to relief to surreal in half an hour. Foxx’s family was one of eight to lose their homes that night, Sept. 3, 2022.
While the blaze eliminated her possessions, particularly an expensive wheelchair and hospital bed, the rain that night symbolically washed away emotions. “Standing in the ditch after midnight, watching firefighters, I thought, ‘This is a dream.’ But I knew it was my low point,” she recalled.
It would be another two years of scrambling re-assemblance, including personal therapy, before clearing skies beamed a light for Foxx’s future and a new chance at a better life for her daughter.
The measure of hope, as if from a parallel universe, divinely emerged from a separate, unrelated house fire and another mother’s love for her daughter.
Tribute to a Teacher
In 2009, a fire destroyed a house in one of Southaven, Mississippi’s west-end older neighborhoods, around the corner from Hope Sullivan Elementary and near where novelist John Grisham once lived. The incident resulted in no reported injuries, but the quarter-acre property was later cleared.
Eventually, the condemned property defaulted into foreclosure until 2019. That’s when DeSoto County resident Debbie Dame and her daughter, Janelle Toungett, placed an ownership bid on the property through a tax auction, which requires holding the top financial bid on any one property for three consecutive annual auctions.
The land was one of about 15 foreclosed properties the pair placed bids on—and the only deed ultimately awarded to them, their first.
But Dame remained uninformed of the gain until after Toungett passed away unexpectedly upon receiving a surprise phone call from a stranger, Hernando DeSoto County Habitat for Humanity President Lee Ashcraft.
“Lee called me one day and said he was with Habitat, and it was interested in purchasing the land. He was how I found out I won the deed,” Dame said. “When I told Lee who my daughter is, he said he knew her and spoke highly of her.”
Toungett, in fact, had recruited students from Horn Lake High School, where she was a health teacher for eight years, to help build Habitat homes.
“When I learned the connection, I knew this was meant to be,” Dame told the Mississippi Free Press.
“It was really a remarkable circumstance,” Ashcraft, who has been with DeSoto’s Habitat since 2000, said. “I’ve never come across a way to a home like this.”
Dame quickly agreed to waive the financial value of the property and donate it to Habitat. With that agreement, Habitat was able to assign the home to Foxx, who had been an applicant on Habitat’s waiting list for over a decade—even before the 2022 fire—and was next in line for a house.
The mother’s generous gift will now become a proudly visceral tribute, like a monument, to her daughter: a permanent extension of Toungett’s heart and passion for helping her community.
A series of weekend work on the new, 1,900-square-foot brick home began in November. Roofing concluded around Thanksgiving, Ashcraft said, estimating that Foxx and her family should hopefully be able to move into their new home in February, 2026.
Dame has been, “In on every stop of the way of the building,” by helping on a series of workdays and tuned into the process to see the build finished. “I’m doing this for my daughter, who would have been ecstatic about this going to Habitat and a family.”
The buildup to the day when the family moves in is “emotional,” she said. “It will be exciting.”
‘Keep Going’
Kaniyah Foxx, 22, was born with hydrocephalus, a condition that causes complications of brain bleeding in premature babies and leads to cerebral palsy.
“She’s a lover of all kinds of music and life. She’s excited when you arrive and angry when you must leave,” Foxx said about her daughter, nicknamed the “hype girl.”
When Kaniyah was born, her mother dropped out of school to raise her. Foxx later completed cosmetology training and now works as a professional hair stylist. Her salon equipment were inexplicably the only items spared from the apartment fire, she said, enabling her to continue to work after they temporarily moved in with relatives.
It has been a winding, difficult struggle for Foxx, said her mother, Ethel Tunstall. The family has bounced from a series of rental homes or apartments with limited space.
The family currently rents a home not far from what will be their new one. Foxx’s mother will also be living in the new three-bedroom house especially designed to accommodate Kaniyah with a turn-around bathroom for a wheelchair and other conveniences.
“As a parent, it was hard to watch my daughter struggle, and I have tried to be there for her. She has faced hardships taking care of her daughter—so many challenges,” Tunstall, Kannisha’s biggest supporter, said. “All along her journey, I told her over and over again, ‘You can’t stop. Keep going.’”
The new home will be a life-changing experience, Foxx insisted, with improved independence. “Kaniyah will be able to take a bath on her own,” she said. “It will be accessible for her, and she will have her own bedroom.”
So, too, will her daughter have a backyard all her own, a missing element of her childhood, Foxx noted. “The new home will make up for lost opportunities for my daughter, who missed out on many typical experiences children enjoy,” she said.
All About the Volunteers
For the last 20 years, professional carpenter Shane Laughter has helped Habitat erect around 15 homes in DeSoto County. His first one unfolded after a contractor Laughter was working for who was helping Habitat invited Laughter to come and give a hand.
“The first home, we renovated one in the Town of Walls, where there are a cluster of Habitat houses,” Laughter, a Cochran, Mississippi, resident, recalled to the Mississippi Free Press at the new home construction site. “Every build makes an impact for families, and every family, like the home we build, has its own story to tell.”
Laughter said he is drawn to help build because he meets new people, many of whom are fellow carpenters, who all share the same goal.
“This work is very satisfying,” he said. “So, it’s a coordination of people with the same interest.”
Mike Mooneyham became involved in supporting Habitat starting in 2017 after he and Compel Church members in Hernando, Mississippi, participated in a service-project day assigned for a Habitat build.
He had long been a fan of the home improvement TV show, “This Old House,” which has episodes involving Habitat, he said. So when he read the church notice about a Habitat building needing volunteers, he was “ready to go.”
“For years, I wanted to get involved with Habitat and just never had the chance,” he said.
In Mooneyham’s initial endeavor to frame a Habitat home, he realized how much more help was needed for the local Habitat’s new build operations.
Little did Mooneyham initially anticipate how much volunteer work that day would sway his perspective and work life, as he has since become a dedicated volunteer at new Habitat builds.
His assistance taught him a redeeming lesson for retaining first-time Habitat volunteers. “I learned over time that instead of trying to focus on being hands-on myself, it was more helpful to work with volunteers and guide them on how to build,” he said.
“Habitat is about volunteers. We want them to be able to feel like they’ve contributed, that they got skin in the game,” he added. “So, I prioritize that over trying to bring in professionals to do the work, though we do bring in a crew to finish painting so it’s not needed—removing another expense—for many years.”
One of DeSoto Habitat’s all-volunteer board of directors, Mooneyham said there are deliberate efforts to ensure that new Habit homeowners are moving into first-class, well-built homes, and that construction—especially the final touches—are long-lasting. “We don’t want the homeowner to face expensive costs of major repairs in five years,” he said. “We make sure that the finished product for the Habitat homeowner was done the right way.”
Mooneyham’s volunteerism also resulted in an interior, otherwise costly feature becoming part of the homes built in DeSoto. A Habitat building contractor, Dan Williams, taught him how to build kitchen cabinets, he said, and now they are incorporated into each of the new Habitat homes.
Others at Compel Church have contributed to Habitat homeowner’s big-ticket needs and are likely to help again. “Many kinds of fruits come about from participating in these builds,” he said in circumspect.
While various churches typically encourage congregations to volunteer on Habitat workdays, others come from other walks of life.
On one Saturday morning, a group included Wyatt Hall and Daniel Spirig, who sized lumber to fit using saws and pounded nails into them as several volunteers continued to piece together the house’s framework. On some of the standing boards, volunteers scribbled Bible verses of hope and praise.
Both men accepted a paid full workday to help build thanks to their employer, a medical company out of Hernando. They returned on another Saturday to continue helping.
Hall said he had performed similar carpentry work 15 years ago, while the skilled labor to build a house contrasted from how houses are built in Spirig’s native country, Switzerland.
“This is new for me,” Spirig said. “Where I am from there’s no wood at all, the home is all brick.”
Index Cards and Relationships
Ruth Ashcraft Munday and her sister, Betsy Ashcraft Walker, fill supportive roles for Habitat and their dad, Lee. Their father continues to secure properties for Habitat, building one new home for a family in need an average each year.
The nonprofit’s budget derives primarily from an annual, popular and greatly supported benefit, called HomeRun for Habitat for Humanity 5K, which yields around $30,000. The other funding comes from community contributions. During fiscal year 2024, Habitat for Humanity built approximately 16,616 new and rehab construction homes in the U.S. and Canada. Mississippi currently has 14 local chapters.
While many communities respond to assist Habitat because of its national reputation, the hard work of bringing the help together and executing it in DeSoto County is driven by Ashcraft, a glue in the process, Munday said.
“Dad is my role model for resilience and seeing things through,” she praised. “He believes he is doing God’s work, and it’s important to him that the work is done to a high standard. That’s his satisfaction.”
She described her dad as affable, methodical and above all, a people-person. He jots down contact information on anyone who might be interested in helping build a home.
“He keeps index cards of people’s names in his pocket with him every day,” Munday said.
Laughter confirmed his approach: “He writes down everything on paper, keeps it with him and will text when a new build is about to happen,” he said. “Lee is one of the truly kindest people you will ever meet, and you know it to be true the first time you meet him.”
Munday said her dad critically maintains long-term relationships with volunteers. “He’s very good at finding jobs that fit a volunteer’s skill set and what they are comfortable with,” she said. And he keeps up with new homeowners long after moving vans have left.
“He’s usually the point person for them when they need new home living advice like how to change the air conditioning unit’s filter (and with other home-maintenance tasks),” Munday added.
Up from the Ashes
Long, difficult years had passed since Foxx submitted an application that received approval for an eventual Habitat house.
“Each year was tough, but I never stopped believing. I didn’t give up,” she said. “I never lost faith.”
Foxx clearly remembers the day she received the call with notice that a property was finalized for her. She soon made the drive to the address—on a Friday morning—located about five miles from the home she now rents.
When she arrived, she stepped alone onto the edge of the yard and prayed. It was a culminating moment. She dreamed of the possibilities ahead and absorbed the elusive triumph over hardships.
Months later, on the first day that a work crew and supplies arrived at the site, Dame appeared. Ashcraft introduced the two women, then relayed Trumball’s story and how the property was acquired.
“We then prayed together. I feel connected to Ms. Foxx, doing something for her that my daughter would do,” Dame said.
In time, Dame looks forward to meeting Foxx’s daughter, she said, and crystalizing an ethereal bond between the two families stronger than brick and mortar.
Perhaps that may formally begin to happen around a dinner table in the new home, where Trumball already has planned a celebratory menu consisting of greens, mac and cheese, yams and casseroles.
“It will be big!” Trumble predicted.
“I thank God for all of this and for the possibilities ahead,” Foxx said. “God’s timing is perfect: Even in the middle of a storm, He will find you.”
Habitat for Humanity officials in DeSoto County rely on volunteers and donations, including vacant properties. To help, call 901-262-8465.