By Buddy Maggio
When I was detecting for artifacts, I was often asked what was the best relic that I found, and if anything unusual ever happened. To the first question, I would answer – all of the artifacts. As to the most unusual incident, it was when I was relic hunting near the bridge that courses Red River at Grand Ecore. I heard a car door slam shut. A few minutes later a young boy about 7 or 8 years old came running toward me and was crying.
I asked what was the matter and he said his daddy was going to jump into Red River. As we walked back to the bluff, I observed a man was sitting on the ground with his feet propped against a pine tree near the bluff holding another man around his waist. Red River was about 100 feet below.
The man he was holding kept shouting, “Let me go! Let me go!”
I was thinking what I could to help without putting myself in danger. I remembered that I had a chain in my truck that was about 20 feet in length.
I threw one end of the chain to the man and he tied the chain around the person’s waist. With the man pushing and me pulling we got the person to the top safely. It is ironic that I found the chain about a year earlier in a wooded area. Little did I realize then that it would be used to help save a man’s life.
About three months later the man came into my place of business and he acted as though he did not recognize me, but I sure recognized him.
