ALTRUISM

Three churches got together and also helped the Wilsons rebuild their lives.
By JEANNE STARMACK
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
CANFIELD -- The pounding was relentless and insistent at the construction site on state Route 46 south of here.
Under a blue sky, surrounded by golden leaves and above a ground of dirt packed down by many feet and mud imprinted by wet tire tracks, several men and teenage boys worked to finish the shell of a three-bedroom ranch house.
That house will shelter four people whose lives were forever changed in August by a tree limb.
The hammers, wielded by volunteers from three churches, pounded urgently. The volunteers -- from Minerva Christian Fellowship, Minerva; Berea Fellowship, Leetonia; and Hebron Fellowship, Alliance -- were expecting to be finished with the shell by the end of the day Saturday.
Then, friends and relatives of 27-year-olds Tim and Susan Wilson were expected to take over to help them finish the interior of their new house.
David Overholt, a member of Minerva Christian, said he was probably going to come back after Saturday.
"For us, we're finishing today. But I might come back and give him a hand. Cut firewood or something."
He turned to Susan. "We have a splitter too, and we can bring it down and split it up for you."
She smiled and nodded. She was trying to keep an eye on the couple's two daughters, Riley, 5, and Reagan, 2, who were exploring at the site a few feet away.
On Aug. 21, Reagan's birthday, the tree limb interrupted the young family's lives.
Needed more space
A year earlier they had bought the land on Route 46, at an auction, for their dream house, Susan said. At the time, they lived in Sebring. Then the house next door to their land went up for sale. So they bought it, and in March moved from their home in Sebring "that was just too small," Susan added.
They intended to build their dream home a little at a time. The basement had gone in first more than a year ago, said Overholt, the block layer who'd done the work. The subfloor also was finished.
Tim, a self-employed construction contractor, was planning to start working on the shell of the house in August.
Turning point
But Aug. 21, he was on a ladder trimming a tree in his family's yard. A cut branch swung around and knocked the ladder out from under him.
"He fell 20 feet," said Susan. "He crushed the base of his spinal cord and is paralyzed from the waist down."
After he heard about the accident, Overholt organized the church volunteers to do the home's shell. The began their work Oct. 21.
"People helped us, too," he said. "We have a handicapped daughter, and people helped us too when we were in trouble. I think we should help each other, you know. I always ask myself, 'What would Jesus do?'"
Tim was not at the house site Saturday afternoon. Susan said he can't get around the area in his wheelchair, but he is able to come over, sit in the car and see it from the road. It helps to keep his spirits up, she said, and he is doing well emotionally.
Susan said she is not sure when the house will be done, but the family is pushed into getting it finished now because their house next door is for sale.
Tim can't work for his company, Ozark Construction, any more, she said, and she had been the secretary for their business. "So we can't afford the mortgage, so it's for sale," she said.
"We're running out of money for everything," she said, although the land and the materials for the house are paid for.
She said she's not sure yet how she and Tim will make a living.
"Tim needs full-time care, and we've got the two kids," she said. "If I go to work, there's no one to take care of the little ones and Tim."
She said her parents recently moved to Florida, but that Tim has a big family who has been helping them.
"And these guys," she said, indicating the volunteers, still busy pounding away, "have been unbelievable."
starmack@vindy.com