lending a hand — and a tractor
Minnesota community comes together to harvest crops for injured farmer
When Minnesota farmer Scott Legried wasn't able to harvest his soybean crop, more than a dozen people showed up to get the job done.
Legried was seriously injured in an August car accident; when he swerved to avoid hitting a puppy in the road, Legried went off the road, and ended up breaking his collarbone, a shoulder blade, and seven ribs; cracking two vertebrae; and sustaining a collapsed lung and concussion. Doctors said he wouldn't be able to get on a tractor for several months, which was a major problem, as Legried runs his farm in the town of Frost almost entirely on his own, and the harvest from his 600 acres of corn and soybeans is his lone source of income.
Once word spread in Frost — population 198 — of what happened, one neighbor was able to recruit 18 farmers to help Legried. On Oct. 4, they arrived at Legried's farm with their equipment and in no time had the soybeans harvested; they will come back later in the month for the corn. "This is a busy time of year for farmers, so it meant the world to me," Legried told The Washington Post. "But I guess I really wasn't surprised. I'm lucky to live in a community where people have always looked out for each other."