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  1. #1
    Senior Member AirborneSapper7's Avatar
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    Hard times hammer handyman

    Jack of all trades always found work, until his customers lost their jobs.
    John Brecher / msnbc.com
    updated 4:21 p.m. ET, Wed., July. 15, 2009


    Terry Gonyon in the kitchen of the eight-bedroom Elkhart home he lost to foreclosure. Gonyon's family, including most of his nine kids, are now crammed into a three-bedroom mobile home.Mike Stuckey

    ELKHART, Ind.— If you think Terry Gonyon is the kind of guy who has trouble being industrious or working hard, check out the stove he built.

    Six-hundred pounds of expertly welded steel, the wood-fired boiler heats 50 gallons of water at a time. He rigged it to warm and circulate the water without being pressurized and so its exterior surfaces get no hotter than the water, about 150 degrees – two keen safety features in a household where most of the family’s nine children were often tumbling about.

    Hooked up via old automotive radiators to a forced-air system, it let the Gonyons heat their home through fierce Midwest winters for $40 worth of wood each month instead of $600 or more for natural gas.

    Ingenuity like Gonyon’s has been a standard trait of Elkhart residents for so long that outsiders have wondered if there’s something in the water. And the skills it took to design and build the boiler are but a few that the 38-year-old Elkhart native and jack-of-all-trades has used to earn a living since he finished high school.

    A drywall man for 20 years with the burly biceps to show for it, he is well-known locally for his ability to patch water damage and match any texture you throw at him. He can tape and finish flat wall until it’s as smooth as a baby’s butt. He can and has built entire houses from the foundation up, framing, wiring, plumbing, you name it. He’s not half bad at wrenching on cars, too.

    “I’m pretty versatile,â€
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  2. #2
    ELE
    ELE is offline
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    This is such a sad and all too typical story for Americans.

    This is the kind of American our government is replacing with illegal labor via not enforcing our immigration laws.
    Join our efforts to Secure America's Borders and End Illegal Immigration by Joining ALIPAC's E-Mail Alerts network (CLICK HERE)

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