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Will He Come Back--- update

Ellis Kinney

Ellis Kinney

Well-known Member
Location
Northern Ky. 30 miles Southeast of Cincinnati
About one month later, give or take a couple of days. Some of you might remember a post I made back a while about giving a five gallon can full of gas to a
young man who had run out over on the four lane highway near my house. ( The AA Highway ). He seemed like a very nice young man, polite. Anyway I left him
with a can of gas and my address and asked him to return it full. Well to this date no show. Some of you critiqued me for leaving the can with him, but I was
really hoping he would return with a full can and thank me for the time and gas. It wasn't about either the can or the gas. Yea I would do it again. Ellis
 

Its a shame. Maybe something came up that prevented him from making good. Maybe he lost the paper with your address. Maybe he doesn't care. None of that really matters though. That you helped a fellow in need with no expectation of compensation and would do so again is what matters.
 
i remember that. i would have done the same thing but i would have taken the gas to the car and dumped it in. to me a couple gallons of gas is worth more so he be gone. i did not post one way or the other as i gave him the benefit of the dought .
 
These are newly hard times for a lot of people who until recently have been very secure. Most people remember being helped when they are not in a position to repay it immediately. It is unlikely the young man will contact you again, but some time in the future he will very probably help one or more strangers just like you helped him. Pay it forward if you like the term. In the meantime, the people in trouble have much bigger things to worry about than $30 worth of fuel can and fuel.
 
Just write it off as a test of human nature. I give people the benefit of the doubt myself at times. I had 4 nice kitchen chairs that I put on Craigslist a few years ago. I had a young couple that said they worked in the local town and lived some 25 miles away. They loved the chairs and said they matched the 2 kitchen chairs they had perfectly. They said the whole family could sit together at meal time if they had them. They said they had some medical bills they had paid earlier and would come back of Friday to pay me for them when they got their paychecks. I felt sorry for them and let them take them that day. Never heard from them again. I chalked it up as a learning experience and hoped their story was true and they didn't go and resell them.
 
A few years ago I loaned my homemade jumper cables (pair 15 ft of 1/0 AWG welding cables with commercial clamps) to a tractor puller at the conclusion of a local show. Told him to toss them in the back of my truck - which was just steps from his DOA tractor - soon as he was finished.

Never saw my cables again. And sadly never saw the jerk again either...
 
I remember your post. Reminds me of once in 5th grade I shared my lunch cookies with a kid and he said he'd pay me back but his family moved and left town the next week. Sixty five years later and I still haven't got over it.
 
Another good rule is to never unhook the chain till your paid if you pull someone out. They will stiff you every time otherwise.
 
Thanks for being a good person. I have helped and been helped. I was on my way to US 131 one Saturday when my truck suddenly over heated, it broke a water pump pulley. I walked back to a little store and called a friend. While I was waiting several people stopped to offer help. One young man went to a local junk yard and returned with a suitable pulley. Helped me install, refused any payment and left. Now that’s help. Of course with a race rig there was ample tools and water.
 
Sometimes you guys amaze me, You say you want to help a person in trouble and than except payment ,like bring back the can full of gas! My idea of helping someone is DON'T expect payment for helping a person.....JUST help them and hope someday someone will help you!! Just my take on this subject, I'm not taking sides Jim in N.M.
 
[b:6401f31eca]..... It wasn't about either the can or the gas. Yea I would do it again.[/b:6401f31eca]
Click to expand...

[size=18:6401f31eca]Ellis, you're the man![/size:6401f31eca]

Reminds me of a saying I have posted above the desk in my shop:

mvphoto66586.jpg


Never regret being a good person to the wrong people. Your behavior says everything about you, and their behavior says enough about them.
 
I agree.

Once, after a snowstorm, I helped someone from out of state get their car out of a snow bank and back on the road. The fellow wanted to pay me. I told him about one time I suffered an appendicitis attack in Indianapolis while driving across country, and several local people went 'way out of their way to bail me out.

I told this fellow the best payment he could give me would be to help someone else out sometime when they needed it.
 
Lot of excuses for the fellow,more than likely he is just a deadbeat going thru life taking advantage of as many bleeding hearts and suckers as he can find.
Good con men always seem nice and sincere its their profession.
 
You know TF, there are times (like today for example) where I am TOTALLY GLAD that you read my replies on the YT site .... yuk !!!!
 
I remember your post. At the time, I also suspected you’d get stiffed. Several months ago, I was at a farm sale and bought a bunch of stuff in a box for $20. A guy walked up to me and wanted a single item out of it and he offered me $5 for a single item. I said okay. He reached in his wallet and told me that he didn’t have a fiver, but would immediately get change and come back to me. I knew where this was going, but since I didn’t want that single item, I said “okay”. I saw him several times again during the sale, I just never saw the $5.
Oh, well..,
 
Whenever someone offers to pay me for helping in an emergency situation, I always tell them to do the same for someone else some day. They will almost certainly get the opportunity.
 
I had guy in the mud once, he refused to let me pull him out because he had AAA with free towing. I let him use the house phone after a heated conversation he phased and handed the phone to me. The tow truck owner told me you tell that ### I am not coming. I had to help him winch his truck out a couple days before. When I hung up the guy asked “what did he say” I said “I am AAA. “. I pulled him out for no charge. A few days later I saw the tow truck owner. He asked about the guy and when I told him what I did he gave me a $20.00
 
With all due respect, sir, but you are WRONG!

I don't see it as expecting payment. The guy was in a bad situation. Ellis LOANED him a can full of gas to get him back on the road. Rather than payment, he asked to have the can returned the same way as it was LOANED to him. You do understand the concept of a LOAN don't you?

I don't see any expectation of payment or profit here - just return what you borrowed.
 
(quoted from post at 13:55:52 12/13/20) Yes it would, I'm just down the road from Augusta. I shop in that store from time to time. Actually the AA is #9 and #8 is the Mary Ingles Highway that runs
along the river. Where are you from? Ellis
Click to expand...
live in Jackson, Mo. was a Do-It-Best hardware driver for 10 yrs from 1988 to 1998. I was over there the year that you all had the bad snow that closed all the Northern Ky roads.
 
Opened up in 1984, before that my farm was way out in the country. Now city folks buying 5 acres and think they are still in the country, because they didn't know how it used to be. I'm about 2 miles from the AA and can hear the road tractors pulling the grade at night. PROGRESS. Ellis
 
been 22 years since I was over there. Had a store in Falmouth then came across a 2 lane to Augusta. As I was coming down the steep hill I would blow the air horn and Darrell would come down to the store and unload me, said he would rather unload me that night than try to unload and wait on customers the next morning. Is it still Bradfords or has it changed hands?
 

It may have been well worth the price of the gas and container to have the "character" get his car running and move on.

GOSH, though, when did those (useless) red plastic 5-gallon gas "cans" get SO expensive?
 
Found, I thought a new girlfriend several years ago. Dated a few weeks, and one night we had over a foot of snow and temps about 20
below, which don't happen around here. She heated her house with kerosene and didn't have any and know way to get out to get it and
probably no money either. Being the nice guy that I am, I took her 4 5 gal cans full. The next day called and broke it off with me
and I haven't seen her or my cans since.
 
Those useless cans got expensive when idiots used those
cans, got burned and sued the manufacturers.
 
BDC-I live almost exactly 1/2 way between Falmouth and Augusta. You
would've drove right past my farm on your way across. Yes it is still
called Bradfords, and I do not know the previous owners or if it is
the same ones, but I believe a lady named Marlene owns it now. They
are a well stocked store and knowledgeable too. Years ago I always
went to a small hardware store in Powersville, only 2 miles away, but
gone now, and I bet you delivered there too. Their roof hung out
almost over the road and they had no parking, except across the road
at the church. To deliver there you would have had to stop in the
road. Bradfords is the last hardware store in our county. Mark.
 
Good to hear you guys talking about Falmouth, KY and AA Highway. My daughter-in-law taught school in Falmouth for many years. She was there during the flood that put downtown Falmouth under water.
 
(quoted from post at 17:49:37 12/13/20) Don't know the owners name, but Falmouth, Alexandria and Augusta are all ACE hardware I think. Mark Robke will know. Ellis
Click to expand...
onrad Furniture and Hardware in Falmouth was owned by Russ Conrad. I was delivering there at the time of the flood. The lady that owned Bradford's then was named Carol, she was a short redhead. I went thru Powersville but did not have a stop there. Was cleaning up and throwing away old papers one day recently and found the flood edition of the Falmouth paper.
 
A few years back there was a stretch of highway that was closed down due blowing snow and glare ice. Just awful road conditions. About every 1/8 mile there was a vehicle or semi in the ditch. I drove up to the yard that I drive tractor on the side for and there was a girl in the ditch with her car on its side. I crawled down by her to see if she was alright and she was. She was able to crawl out of the car. I asked if there was anything else I could to help as they banned anyone from getting pulled out. She asked if I could say I was driving. She didn’t have a license. County sheriff pulled up, wished her luck and I headed back to the warm shop. Lol
 
Wouldn't worry about it. The years may go by, and eventually the young man will think about it, and start being the good guy to people.
 
Only cost you 20 gallons of kerosene to get rid of her ?
You got away CHEAP,consider yourself lucky .
 
When that flood occurred in '97, it rained over 12" or 15" in 24 hrs. Two forks of the Licking River meet at Falmouth, and just buried the town in a short time overnight. Augusta got it too from the Ohio, but Falmouth was terrible. Mark.
 
(quoted from post at 14:42:31 12/14/20) When that flood occurred in '97, it rained over 12" or 15" in 24 hrs. Two forks of the Licking River meet at Falmouth, and just buried the town in a short time overnight. Augusta got it too from the Ohio, but Falmouth was terrible. Mark.
Click to expand...
know when I started making deliveries there after the flood it was terrible. Houses pushed off foundations, portable buildings moved around and lots of debris every pushed up in piles.
 
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