A good mail carrier doesn’t only deliver the mail but they also serve as “surveyor of the community.” No one knows the local neighborhood like your mail carrier.
They walk those streets every day and know just about everyone in the community. So, they’ll be the first to know when something isn’t right in the neighborhood.
Josh Hefta is one of those mailmen, and because he knows his community so well he was able to save a neighbor’s life. That’s what earned him the Postmaster General Award, the highest award a mail carrier can receive.
“I’ve never had anything like this happen to me,” Hefta said. “Pretty big honor.”
Alice Paschke was one of the people on Hefta’s 162 stop route in Walsh County, North Dakota.
“Alice was just a nice lady and she was out there by herself,” Hefta told WDAZ 8 said.
He started to keep an eye on the woman to make sure she was OK, especially as the weather got colder.
He and his co-workers eventually would bring her mail directly to her house every day “because she was getting slower.” It was a cold day in January when he knocked on her door and heard no response. He started to knock louder.
“I thought I could hear a faint somebody in the house,” he said.
Eventually, Paschke called out to him.
“I said, ‘Come in, I need help!” she told the news outlet.
Alice fell and was too weak to get back up again. She had been laying on the floor, helpless, for about 20 hours.
But she knew that Hefta would be by around 12:45 p.m. the next day. Hefta wasn’t sure what to do at first and didn’t think he could break through the door.
“I hit it pretty good twice and it popped,” he said. “Adrenaline I guess.”
Paschke said she was relieved when Hefta came through her door. Following her fall, Paschke’s house was razed and she moved into a nursing home.
Even though she no longer sees Heft on a daily basis she says she’ll never forget him.
“For the rest of my life, for as long as my memory works, I’m going to remember,” she said.
Hefta no longer gets to enjoy a can of Coke and Rice Krispie treat each day at Paschke’s house but is glad she is in a place where she is safe.
You can watch their touching story below.
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