[music]

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WYNC. A.J. Jacobs, the journalist, NPR contributor, author of many books, and self-proclaimed human guinea pig, has an essay in the New York Times, and here's the gist of it if you haven't seen it. If you saved me and my sister on a cold, rainy night in Alaska 34 years ago, I would like to thank you. Now, Jacobs and his sister got lost, he tells us, in the waterways of Glacier Bay National Park in Alaska for many cold, rainy long hours, until in the early morning hours, they heard some voices in the distance.

They followed those voices and stumbled upon a group of five people camping on one of the islands. "Even though the campers were a little buzzed on beers," A.J. says, they gave A.J. and his sister dry clothing, food, and a place to sleep that night. The next morning, the Jacobses were reunited with their parents. Now, 34 years later, A.J. wants to find any of those five people in that group to say thank you. We thought we'd use the resources of our radio show to try and help them and also give any of you who want to call in to an opportunity to shout out a stranger who helped you at any time and disappeared in your life. 212-433-WNYC. Hi, A.J., welcome back to WNYC. Always great to have you on.

A.J. Jacobs: Thank you, Brian. Thanks for having me on.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, again, who's that stranger who helped you out of a pickle, big or small, once upon a time and you never saw them again? Whether or not you want to find them, you want to thank them. 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692, or tweet @BrianLehrer. I see we already have one tweet like this. We'll get to it. A.J., what a story. How'd you get lost in Glacier Bay National Park in Alaska?

A.J. Jacobs: Well, it was in the '80s. I was in college, and we were on a family trip to Alaska. One afternoon, my sister and I, we rented a kayak for an hour. We paddle out. It's beautiful. We turn around after half an hour to paddle back, but the channel we had paddled through, it had disappeared. We found it out later it was because the tides had changed. We were baffled and lost, so we just made a right turn and kept paddling. Like you said earlier, it got colder, it got darker. It wasn't fun anymore. On land, my parents were understandably freaking out because the park rangers had told them it was quite likely we had been swept out to sea and drowned.

Brian Lehrer: Wow.

A.J. Jacobs: As you mentioned, at around 1:00 in the morning, after hours of paddling, we heard these rowdy campers, the only campers for miles. Thank God [laughs] they were up and a little buzzed and making enough noise, and they rescued us. They paddled out and gave us food and dry clothes and just showed incredible kindness. These are polarized times. I sometimes have to remind myself that humans have this amazing capacity for science, for kindness. I wanted to write this story about these strangers who saved my life and my quest to find them and thank them because, as you know, I'm very into gratitude.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, you wrote a whole book on gratitude. I guess that's why 34 years later, you're undertaking this mission. You realize they might be Sarah Palin voters, right?

A.J. Jacobs: [laughs] That's funny. I thought of that. It's like, "What if I find and their [unintelligible 00:03:57]?" but listen, even so, I would still be grateful to them. Yes, I told this story and my son, he was 14 at the time, he said, "Well, why don't you go and thank them?" It was a great project, especially during the pandemic, to remind myself of the bright spots of humanity.

I put the story on Facebook and said, "I'm looking for these guys," because we never got their names. We were due too frazzled by the whole thing. I got hundreds of responses on Facebook. People just showed the same level of kindness that these campers did. They volunteered to help with my search. There were these self-proclaimed Sherlocks who tracked down people who worked in Alaska in the '80s. I got the emergency report from 1988 with the name of one of the campers. That was a huge clue. His name was Doug Rand.

I spent several weeks calling every Doug Rand I could find, dozens of Doug Rands. I haven't found the right one yet, but even so, it's been a wonderful experience. I got to meet this cross-section of America through Doug Rands. They told their stories about the kindness of strangers. I even got a little closure because I found the people who rented us the kayak and they were so apologetic about not telling us, preparing us. They said they changed their policy. Maybe we saved someone. I wrote this up, and there were hundreds of comments on the New York Times article. Most of them are about people telling their own stories about the kindness of strangers.

Brian Lehrer: We've got about 10 minutes and, boy, do we have stories coming in on the phones and on Twitter, or listeners help A.J. Jacobs find the real Doug Rand. I'll tell you very briefly because we want to go to the calls and the tweets, believe it or not, something much more mild, but a little bit similar happened to me.

A.J. Jacobs: Hmm? [inaudible 00:06:03]

Brian Lehrer: I was backpacking one time in Canyonlands National Park, which is a very desert park in Utah. My friend and I didn't bring enough water for the number of nights we were going to be out. We didn't realize just how dry it was going to be out there. It wasn't like anything I ever experienced growing up in Queens. That was our last night in, I was like, "Ah, we're thirsty. How's this going to work? We have to hike out tomorrow morning. How are we going to get through the night?" Sure enough, we stumbled upon some other campers. They had all this water and they shared generously with us. Whoever you were in Utah, I don't know if you were Doug Rand on the next leg of your journey, but thank you.

A.J. Jacobs: That's lovely. Yes, I've heard hundreds of these stories. [unintelligible 00:06:55] people getting lost in a blizzard and a snowmobile club rescuing him and giving him soup. It restores your faith a little.

Brian Lehrer: Your story is from 34 years ago. Maddie in Brooklyn's story is from yesterday? Maddie, yesterday?

A.J. Jacobs: What?

Maddie: Hi.

Brian Lehrer: Hi.

Maddie: Yes. Hello. I was riding my bike yesterday in the Lower East Side/Chinatown. I looked down in my basket. I had my bag and I could not find my cell phone. It had fallen out somewhere. I started riding back, and there was some ladies in the streets. When I said, "Hi, have you all seen a red cell phone?" They said, "No, no, but tell us your phone number, and we'll call it." Then we all started looking around, and they called some other people. Eventually, after the third phone call, a random guy a few miles back picked it up and said he's just seen a truck run over it and saw it in a ditch.

?A.J. Jacobs: What?

Maddie: He picked it up because it was ringing-

?A.J. Jacobs: Wow.

Maddie: -and called and said hi to me. I said, "Oh, hold on," and he told me-

Brian Lehrer: Hello.

Maddie: -his cross streets. Then I ran back and got it and it was still working.

Brian Lehrer: Boom, so that took-

Maddie: I am calling you from it although it does look like a truck ran over it. That's it.

Brian Lehrer: Multiple people were involved in helping you find that phone. Thank you. Karen in Westfield, New Jersey, is going to go back a lot further than that. Hi, Karen.

Karen: Hi. In 1997, I was Northern India doing my graduate fieldwork with the Tibetan government in exile. I met a grad student, Melissa, who turned out to be invaluable because my brother back in California was HIV positive. It turned out that he had gone into the hospital when I was in India and died and Melissa helped me navigate getting back home when I just couldn't even function.

I know her name, but I've never been able to find her. She's Melissa Adler, a graduate student at Johns Hopkins at the time in public health and was going on to med school. I've never been able to track her down.

Brian Lehrer: All right. Melissa Adler, did you say? If you're-

Karen: Yes.

Brian Lehrer: -out there, you hear how much gratitude Karen in Westfield has for you. Get in touch. If you get in touch with us, we'll help you get in touch with her. Thank you for that, Karen. A couple of tweets. A.J., listener writes, "Michelle in Brooklyn here, thank you to Bernard Diaz from Arecibo Car Service who likely lost his transmission in the 2010, December 26the blizzard driving me home from work in waist-high snow. Two miles took us six hours. He never gave up. Gracias por siempre. How about that from Michelle in Brooklyn?

A.J. Jacobs: Wow.

Brian Lehrer: Another one. This says, "Two weeks after high school graduation in 1969, I almost drowned at the Jersey Shore. A classmate whom I didn't know, but was there because he knew one of the other girls was brave enough to pull me in when I was able to help myself. I Wish I could remember his name. What do you think about these stories so far? We've got four of them already.

A.J. Jacobs: They're putting me in a good mood. It's like humans really do have the good side. I also love the cellphone story because it turned into a team effort, which is something that I've seen with my story with all these people on Facebook and they became friends through this search. These people are having reunions because they met, so I think when people do good, when they collaborate to do good, it's a great way to form community.

Brian Lehrer: Hiram in Park Slope has another international story. Hiram, you're on WNYC. Hello.

Hiram: Hey, how are you doing? Good morning. Sorry, a siren [unintelligible 00:11:06]. I was an exchange student and I met another guy who was also an exchange student while I was in a computer lab back then. He lives in Berlin and I went up to visit him, and this was before Facebook, [unintelligible 00:11:22] my old Hotmail account, and I've always wanted to get in touch with this guy again. He's from Missouri and he's got to be probably 40 or 41, but it was an amazing encounter. I had a great time hanging out with him, and I've always thought about this, and then when A.J. was talking about this, it really-- Yes, I just want to find this person.

Brian Lehrer: That's great. You know you're old when you can say I had a Hotmail account. Hiram, thank you very much. Erica in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Hello, Erica.

Erica: Hi. Thank you so much. Mine isn't quite as dramatic and life-saving as other stories, but in the very rare case that this person happens to be listening, I would love to just do this in public thank you. Back in 2017, I was signed up for the Falmouth Road Race over the summer in Cape Cod. I wasn't in great shape to train for it, but in the midst of everything, I have a history of cancer and got a positive biopsy back, and so I was really not in any mental or physical shape. Physically, I was fine at that point, but just my life was a little bit turned upside down at that point, but I was signed up for the race with a friend.

About, I don't know, a third of the way through, I just collapsed, was really not doing well, and just emotionally it was very overwhelming, and came across this woman whose name was Kathleen. I have no idea what her last name was, but my mom's name happens to be Kathleen, so she was like, "Oh, we were meant to find each other." She just walked/ran with me for the rest of the race and just talked with me the whole time. What felt like a big failure because I was looking forward to this and it was a big thing to get into the race ended up just being a moving experience.

She lives, I think somewhere in New Hampshire or Massachusetts, so I would very much doubt that she's listening to this, but in the event that someone knows Kathleen who ran the Falmouth Road Race in 2017, thank her for me.

Brian Lehrer: Beautiful. Erica, thank you very much. A couple more from Twitter. A.J., before we run out of time, a listener writes, "Thank you to the bus driver, the week after 911, who found my phone on his bus and took the time to drive the bus to meet me where I was at the end of his shift. New York City always gives us her best," writes that listener named [unintelligible 00:13:57].

Then another one. Let's see. Oh, this is another I-almost-drowned story. "In 1991, I was at the beach with my friend at our mom's in Virginia Beach, kids got swept out by the undertow. Our moms tried but couldn't get us back in. A young man saw us yelling and ran into the water and swam out and dragged us all back in. Never got his name. I was nine. We'll finish with this tweet. It's a question for you, A.J. Listener writes, "Why did A.J. Jacobs wait 34 years to do this?"

A.J. Jacobs: [laughs] That is a good question. I thank my son Lucas, who was the one who said, "You've got to find them." We were so frazzled at the end that we didn't get their name. I did leave $100 thank you for the campers, but they stayed out camping, so we never saw them again.

Brian Lehrer: A.J. Jacobs, who among other things has written a whole book on gratitude, and now a New York Times article about how he and his sister got lost in the waterways of Glacier Bay National Park for many cold, rainy long hours, until in the early morning they heard some voices in the distance, and a group of five people camping on one of the islands buzzed on beers gave A.J. and his sister dry clothing, food, and a place to sleep that night. If you are Doug Rand or any of the other four people involved, A.J. Jacobs wants to thank you. A.J. for me-

A.J. Jacobs: Please get in touch.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you.

A.J. Jacobs: Oh, well, thank you, Brian, and I'm glad you got that water so that you can continue doing your radio show, which we love.

Brian Lehrer: Bye-bye.

Copyright © 2022 New York Public Radio. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use at www.wnyc.org for further information.

New York Public Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline, often by contractors. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of New York Public Radio’s programming is the audio record.