The newly repainted house looks no more like someone should “burn it down.”
In a heartwarming turn of events, a railroad worker repainted a house with 100 volunteers he had gathered through a post on his social media. The elderly couple inhabiting the house couldn’t be happier as the whole community came together in their time of need.
Oregonian man from Pendleton, Leonard Bullock, had been living in the house since 1982. In 1995, he had to retire from his job as a fork lift driver. Next, in 2000, he met Dorothy, the woman who would be his third wife. They were a perfect match, as she also had been previously married twice. Since then, they have been living together in the house that was slowly decaying.
Insurance repeatedly had refused to take in their house because of its decrepit state. Their pensions, his from Social Security, were much too low and did not allow them to refurbish it so that it could look better and get insured.
Josh Cyganik had been passing by the elderly couple’s house for four long years. Each time he did, he waved to the man who would usually sit on his porch and watch the road. One day not so long ago, Josh was going to his usual job at the Union Pacific, just across the road from the house.
As Josh says in his Facebook post, which gathered a whopping 6,251 shares, he heard two teenagers passing right by the front porch saying that the house was “crappy” and that it should be burned down. Josh immediately thought he should intervene, as he though Bullock had heard them (he did not, though later he was shock when it was told to him).
As Josh confessed later, he thought it was now a matter of respect. So what he did was he went to the local lumber store, Tum-A-Lum, and asked the manager there if he would be willing to help.
Sure enough, Tum-A-Lum donated the paint needed to repaint the house, and at 8 AM on Saturday, about 20 volunteers gathered in front of the Bullocks’ house. Josh had previously told Bullock that he wanted to help and that he would ask for volunteers. The overwhelming turnout numbered at some point 100 men and women. Each of them gave as they could: a hand of paint, a few garden tools, while another group of men decided to refurbish the man’s also decaying porch.
The local Starbucks even donated six gallons of water and ice tea. That is how you do a publicity stunt!
Now everyone is happy in Pendleton and Tum-A-Lum teamed up with a few men and plan on building the man a back porch!
Image source: Facebook: Josh Cyganik