Jim Purdie (above and below) grabbed his chainsaw and set to work when he heard about Mary’s house.

Friends in All Kinds of Weather

Posted June 9, 2011

Mary Herron and her family received help from what she calls “angels everywhere.”

“I thought I could help, so I did.” For Jim Purdie, it was that simple. When Mary Herron, a distraught co-worker, learned that her Jackson, Mississippi, home was badly damaged by a tornado, Jim didn’t hesitate. Leaving the downtown Jackson branch of Regions, where he and Mary Herron both work, he went home, gathered tools and a chainsaw, and struck out for Mary’s storm-ravaged neighborhood. 

“My parents were ‘pre-Depression’ people,” he said. “Anytime someone was in need, they always reminded us that hardship does not discriminate, that somebody else’s trouble could just as well have been ours. I guess I would like to think they rubbed off on me a little bit.”

Even though Jim and his staff knew storms were brewing on the morning of April 15, no one could’ve anticipated the level of damage the area would suffer. It was a little before noon when the sirens went off, and then the office television began broadcasting reports of a tornado right in Mary’s neighborhood.  

As her whole department headed for the stairwells to take shelter, Mary frantically dialed her husband and three daughters to make sure they were safe. Shatima, her 28-year-old was at home getting ready for work when the weather took a dangerous turn. That’s when Mary got the kind of call a mother dreads—the tornado had blown out the living room window and forced her terrified daughter to quickly take cover, alone, in the family laundry room. To make matters worse, Mary couldn’t get to her because the same powerful storm that had just hit her house was now turning toward her office. “So I prayed some more,” she said.

As soon as the storm passed, Mary hurried home, where help soon arrived—about ten people, including Jim and another co-worker, Naomi Williams, who had also dispatched her husband and son to the scene. “Angels everywhere—that’s how it seemed to me,” Mary remembers. “My daughter said, ‘It looks like everybody coming up the street is coming to our house!’ So I told her that as soon as we got situated, we’d help all the other people in the neighborhood.”

What did she think when the head of her division walked into her yard with a chainsaw? “I was surprised to see him right then because we hadn’t called him,” Mary laughed, “but I wasn’t surprised that he came to help because that’s just how he is. He said it was his honor to be there.” 

“Her neighborhood was torn up,” Jim said. “I couldn’t make it all the way to her house, so I got out and walked. She had two huge trees on her house and several holes in her roof. I grew up on a farm, so I knew how to run a chainsaw. All I did at that point was crank up my saw and start cutting. We cut until dark in the rain and got most of it off her roof. Then we tarped the roof so it wouldn’t leak.” 

The whole office was concerned about Mary. They collected money for her and offered support and encouragement. “Mary has worked in the office here for years,” Jim said. “It sounds cliche, but we all feel like we’re family. We have worked together a long time. I brought my oldest son here in a carrier when he was six weeks old. He just graduated law school. We’ve had a picnic for our division just about every year for the past thirty years, with the tradition dating back much longer than that. It’s still held at my original boss’s farm, and of course, he still considers himself an employee. When my youngest child, Laura Beth, was in a serious car wreck, my co-workers came to the hospital every day for a month. I guess that’s why I’m a bit self-conscious over such a small thing as helping Mary. She and everyone else have done more for me than I have ever done for them.” 

Everyone has a story.