The voice was soft and sincere.
“Go ahead and talk to him,” said Abby, Jim Potter’s girlfriend, from the background.
“This story is really not about me,” said Jim Potter, the 75-year-old Vietnam veteran.
“Oh, but it is,” I chuckled.
You aren’t going to believe this story.
It’s about an American who refuses to call himself a hero.
It’s about Jim Potter, from Ashville, Alabama, deciding not to drive by the accident but to do something about it.
“I just passed out, and even today doctors can’t tell me why,” 37-year-old Caleb Carpenter explained.
A few weeks ago, Caleb was driving down Highway 33.
Behind him was Jim Potter, who suddenly witnessed Caleb’s car swerve to the right and barrel 200 feet deep into the woods.
“I knew the woman who lived next to where the car skidded into the woods, so I drove down her driveway,” Mr. Potter said.
“I don’t know if I had a seizure or something else, but I blacked out,” Caleb recalled.
“I can’t remember a thing, but I’m told I hit a tree and my car caught on fire.”
Jim Potter jumped out of his truck and called 911.
Caleb was severely injured, and the car had started to catch fire.
“I’ve seen worse in Vietnam,” Mr. Potter said calmly.
The scene was straight out of a Reader’s Digest “Drama In Real Life.”
“I grabbed the man as the car caught fire — I had a hard time getting his legs out from under the steering wheel — I set him down on the ground away from the fire,” Potter recounted.
“I was completely worn out,” he added.
Caleb was flown out of the woods but still faced a long recovery.
He suffered injuries to his L-3 and L-4 vertebrae, had plates inserted in his knee, and endured a serious ankle injury with a bone sticking through his skin.
Caleb is getting along as best he can, using both a walker and a wheelchair to get around.
And 75-year-old hero Jim Potter?
“I don’t give a lot of interviews,” he said modestly.
“Just make your story about Caleb,” he insisted.
“Yes sir,” I chuckled.
Boy, did I have news for him. 🇺🇸