The one-man rescue squad
Since 1966, Weller, now 60, has spent his days cruising the freeways around San Diego, looking to assist motorists with flat tires, empty gas tanks, and other problems.
Thomas Weller is the Mother Teresa of the freeway, says Elizabeth Douglass in the Los Angeles Times. Since 1966, Weller, now 60, has spent his days cruising the freeways around San Diego, looking to assist motorists with flat tires, empty gas tanks, overheated radiators, and other mechanical problems. “It’s what I do for excitement,” he says. An emergency medical technician by training, Weller drives a battered rig made of pieces of other cars that resembles the Ectomobile in Ghostbusters. Along with such basic equipment as a jack, gas, and compressed air, he packs his Labrador/collie mutt Shela (“a person in a fur suit,” he calls her) and a couple of rifles (“a little bit of self-protection”). Weller was inspired to become a good Samaritan after a passerby once pulled his car out of a snow bank. Now, when he effects a rescue of his own, he hands the grateful recipient a business card that reads, “I ask you for no payment other than for you to pass on the favor by helping someone in distress that you may encounter.” People call him “the San Diego Highwayman,” and he estimates he’s bailed out some 6,000 motorists. These days, though, crippling gas prices have forced him to cut back his excursions to three days a week. “I sit home on my front porch a lot,” he complains. “It’s killing me.”
Sign up for Today's Best Articles in your inbox
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Should Line of Duty return?
Talking Point Adrian Dunbar's hint about a series reboot has some critics worried
By Tess Foley-Cox Published
-
One great cookbook: 'The Zuni Café Cookbook' by Judy Rodgers
The Week Recommends A tome that teaches you to both recreate recipes and think like a cook
By Scott Hocker, The Week US Published
-
Stephen Miller is '100% loyal' to Donald Trump
He is also the architect of Trump's mass-deportation plans
By Joel Mathis, The Week US Published