Nineteen Years Ago Today—A Hero to Remember

This is not my usual light-hearted "nostalgic" post—though the hero I will be writing about is a Baby boomer. This memory is one I must write about today, October 25th.

It was a day much like today—autumn, sun shining, leaves covering the ground, though the trees not completely bare. Normally, a day I would consider to be among the most beautiful of all the days of the year. But this day began for me at 3am with a phone call—that call we all dread—a police dispatcher on the other end of the line.
Of all scenarios I could imagine—the one that was about to unfold, was set aside in my mind as one I could never face.
I went to bed at 11 o'clock and woke up at 1am realizing my husband Ed was still at our office two miles away. He had taken his motorcycle and gone in to fix the computer system that was down. He said it might be a long night—it had to be up and running by morning. Our employees were in the middle of a big job that had to ship the following day.
I was awakened again at 3am to the sound of a Medevac helicopter. It sounded like it was about a mile away, "Oh my God, he's not home...is this it?" I just found myself praying, "...have mercy on my husband, if this is for him, please spare his life!"

Within a short time the phone rang—the state police dispatcher,
"Is this Mrs.Walsh? Your husband has been involved in a motorcycle accident. He has some head injuries and is being Medevaced to the Lehigh Valley Trauma Center. I'm sending some officers to your house, can you give me directions?"

Within minutes two state police officers were walking toward my front door; one holding Ed's helmet and the other his back-pack and the shirt he had been wearing, shredded, in pieces. My son Chris had come upstairs and when he saw them coming started crying, holding me. "We have to be strong for each other," he said. For the first time, I started to panic.

The officers told me he had a leg injury and head injury but could not tell me how serious it was. They also had no idea how the accident happened. There was no deer, no car, he had not hit a tree; but there was glass all over the road. They were going to investigate and get back to me.

I went to see Ed in the hospital and amazingly, his injuries were not life threatening. He did, however, break his neck; but thank God it was in such a place that it did not kill him or paralyze him. He had a puncture wound to his shoulder, 50 stitches on his right knee, several broken fingers, and dislocated toes. His right side was hit pretty badly, but no broken legs.

While Ed was in the hospital he got a call from a lady, also named Mary. She was so interested in knowing how he was and how badly he was injured. He remembered very little about the accident and she told him this amazing story.

She said she runs a little drive through coffee shop a few miles from here. Every morning at 2:30 she picks up bagels for the business and opens at 4am. She said she was driving down the road which was very dark, very dimly lit and saw what she thought were garbage bags, perhaps dragged into the road by a bear. She slowed down to avoid hitting them and realized it was someone lying face down in the middle of the road with pieces of a wrecked motorcycle all around him. She pulled off the road, put on her 4-way flashers, called 911 but realized if this person stayed there he was going to be run over by a car.
As she got out of her car a truck drove by dragging a piece of the bike underneath. He stopped his truck, removed the piece from beneath it—and kept going. She said she went through thinking about how you're never supposed to move an injured person—would she be sued—but then determined she HAD to get him off the road.
She tried to talk to him, explained that he had been involved a motorcycle accident and she had to get him off the road. He told her he didn't own a bike—but his leg was injured. Somehow she had him lean on her and use his good leg to help her get him off the road. This was all happening while about ten cars flew by, none stopping to help her.
The ambulance arrived, took over and the police told her to "move on," not realizing what she had just been through. She was so traumatized she couldn't drive.

That's not the whole story...

The police determined that this was a hit and run. The glass all over the road at the scene of the accident was from a car. Ed had hit the car and smashed through the glass with his head.
Ed did recall riding down the road that night and seeing a car coming in the opposite direction—no blinker—begin to make a left hand turn right in front of him. He tried to slow down, but knew he was going to crash into him—and it was going to be bad. He was going close to 40 mph, slower than usual since it was late and he was tired and watching for deer that often crossed the road in that area. The police believe the car that hit him was yellow because there's yellow paint on parts of the bike.

Ed's bike—before

Ed's bike—after the accident

When I talked to Mary on the phone the following day she said, "I believe in God, but I don't pray very much, so please pray that we find this person! Anyone who could leave a person to die or get run over like that should go to jail!"

It is now nineteen years since the accident that dreadful night. We are very thankful that Ed has healed from most of his injuries—following the initial surgeries. 
To this day, the person who left Ed for dead has never been found.

But, as Mary wrote in the letter she sends to Ed each year at this time,

"Pray for the person who did this to you, because he needs all the prayers you can offer. He will have to answer to a higher power one day and answer for what he did."

Mary was honored by our township with an award for her heroic deed that night. She literally put her life on the line to save my husband's life.

How do you thank a person like this?

One way is to tell this story to at least one person
on this day each year—
and the deed will never be forgotten.

.....And I guess I've done that!

God bless you, Mary Hardy!

The 50's—When Dogs Were Our Heroes...

Just as kids ran free in the 50's, I remember dogs running free as well—maybe it was because most of my early growing up years took place in a country setting, several miles outside of Morristown, New Jersey. We knew all the neighborhood dogs by name. There was Tinker the Shepherd mix and Shea the Springer Spaniel who hid in the closet at the first rumble of thunder—and Drifter the hunting dog. He was the only dog I remember that did not run free. He spent his days in a kennel outside the house.

This was our neighbor's dog "Boxer" and as you can see we were good buddies. The thought of a dog not being friendly never entered my little mind.

That familiar Lassie theme beckoned us home at dinner time and we fell asleep at night dreaming we could own a dog just like Lassie!Imagine a dog that would go get help when you fell into a hole—a dog that could understand you better than another person—and could communicate that understanding!
Our family was blessed to have a dog every bit as wonderful as Lassie. Perhaps he is the reason I have had such a great love for dogs all of my life. His name was Flash—a long haired German Shepherd police dog who came to live with our family in the early 50's. We had taken him in when a friend on Long Island realized a neighbor was intent on poisoning dogs, and they loved him too much to risk that happening to him. We were asked if we would like to have him.

Flash with my oldest brother Marc

Flash was very protective of me and my six brothers. He waited for the school bus with us each morning at the end of the driveway and greeted us there in the afternoon. He positioned himself each night in front of the front door, and that is where he stayed keeping watch, protecting his family. No one entered or exited without his express approval. Often a little one could be found nestled up beside him, resting on his beautiful long coat of fur.

When the ice froze on the neighbor's pond he loved to go ice skating with the neighborhood kids. We would toss a snowball across the ice, grab onto his tail and go for a ride from one end of the pond to the other. No matter where we ventured, Flash was at our heals.

On November 3, 1957, the year I was in kindergarten, a Russian mission blasted off, sending the first dog into orbit around the earth. Laika, a female mutt who was part Siberian Husky, rode on Sputnik 2. (Sputnik 2 was a metal sphere that weighed about 250 pounds = 113 kg).My older brothers brought their Weekly Reader magazines home from school and if the cold war with Russia wasn't already underway, I'm sure this event would have triggered it in the minds of baby boomers across the country! A dog.... in space?Laika was originally thought to have survived in Earth orbit for four days, dying in space when the batteries to the cabin over-heated. In 2002, it was revealed that Laika died roughly 5 to 7 hours into the flight, from overheating and stress.
After orbiting the Earth 2,570 times, Sputnik 2 fell back to Earth on April 14, 1958, burning up during re-entry.

1957 was also the year that Old Yeller stole our hearts—and baby boomers learned that all stories don't have happy endings.

That story prepared me for an event a few years later that would impact my life in ways I would not fully realize until years later—and that event will be the subject of my next post....so "stay tuned"!

(Original artwork-all rights reserved)

When Dogs Were Our Heroes Part II