Reader\'s Digest Australia - 05.2019

READER’S DIGEST

May• 2019 | 61

boys’. “Here was this scared, bewil-
dered little boy with a speech defect,”
Tom said. “He’d ended up in a mental
hospital only because his parents had
been killed in a car accident, and the
state had nowhere else to put him.
That floored me.”
Outwardly fun-loving and easy-
going, Tom had carried an aching
emptiness inside since the death
of his mother when he was 12. Now
here was someone who shared the
same need, someone he could help,
and by helping somehow – together

• fill that need for both of them. But
  Tom didn’t tell it like that. “I looked

at Andy,” he said as we sat on the
gutted porch, “and I saw myself.”
Tom asked to take Andy home.
The hospital administrator stared
hard at him for a long moment, and
then his face softened. “Tom,” he
said, “what makes you think you
can take care of this child?”
“Sir,” Tom replied softly, “in a place
like this, what makes you think you
can?” Andy was informally released
in Tom’s custody.
But a hospital staff member was
soon on the phone. A state inspector

had ordered that Andy be returned.

Tom refused; kidnap charges were

threatened.

Tom took the tearful boy back and

then headed for the state capital,

where a child-welfare supervisor

would decide if a 19 year old could

be allowed to care of Andy.

Kept waiting all morning, Tom

finally marched into the bureau-

crat’s office. When the man threat-

ened to call law enforcement, Tom

shot back, “Go ahead, put me in

jail. I’ll make sure the courtroom

is full of reporters. Then we’ll see

what folks say when they find out

what happens to kids down on their

luc k .”

Tom got Andy back – and the

licence making him the first single

foster parent in Missouri’s history.

A year later he was awarded custody

of Dan, whose drunken father had

killed the boy’s mother. To make ends

meet while Tom finished school, the

three did laundry for other students

and sold pizzas door-to-door.

After graduation Tom visited

George Meuschke, an insurance

man who was much taken by this

The hospital administrator stared hard at him

for a long moment.“Tom, what makes

you think you can take care of this child?”