Don Gardner, a Utah Marine Corps Veteran and Garbage Man, Saves U.S. Flag From the Trash Can and Does What the Owner Should Have; This Isn’t the First Time
We’re looking to add some uplifting and/or motivating stories to kind of balance all the negative news. This one comes in from Utah and shows that just because you’re a garbage man, doesn’t mean you’re trashy like some of those you pick up trash after.
Don Gardner is a garbage man and a U.S. Marine Corps veteran (ooh-rah) who works throughout Emery and Carbon county in Utah. He typically doesn’t need to get out and empty garbage cans as the garbage trucks handle that in today’s modern world, but he’ll get out to handle the can if he notices the U.S. Colors dangling from under the lid.
Last week, Brooke Cowley, a Huntington resident on Gardner’s trash route, caught the veteran lifting an American flag out of her trash can and folding it.
“He pulls up, he gets out of his truck, and I’m thinking, ‘What is he doing?,'” she proclaimed. “And then immediately, I was so embarrassed, like, oh my gosh, I was petrified, because I’m married to a veteran. What am I doing?”
Married to a veteran and still didn’t know…. must be Air Force (joking).
“I took an oath once to defend this country and our flag, and I still do,” Gardner said. “A lot of people died protecting that flag and fighting under that flag. A lot of blood’s been shed so that we have the freedoms that we have today.”
Cowley shared the video on Facebook where she admitted to “accidentally” throwing away the flag during an Easter clean-up which just baffles me. How do you accidentally throw away a 5 feet by 3 feet red, white and blue flag?
“I wanted our community to really see what he did, and to see the care and love that he gave our flag,” she continued. “I wanted them to see and to give him the respect that he gave to our flag.”
Gardner wasn’t aware he was caught on camera.
“It’s just something I do,” he said.
He says he’s saved at minimum a dozen flags from the landfill in his 11 years of working on the job.
“Makes me mad,” he said. “I get angry. Sometimes it’s a mistake. Most of the time, it’s on purpose. I have a problem with that, so I just take it out — take care of it.”
Here’s the local news report for more details.
Semper Fi, brother. When you have people more concerned about BLM flags and ABC Community flags, it’s nice to see the good stories of those who still give a damn about our Stars and Stripes.
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