This is definitely an odd story of survival. You can never tell who's going to make it. I guess it's a story of resiliency, with a surprise happy ending. And the cherry on top: people clearly helped him along the way.

From A.P.:
RALEIGH, N.C. - Hugh Armstrong says he hitchhiked and walked 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometres) south from New Hampshire without knowing who he was. Then he heard his granddaughter's name in a McDonald's in Asheville and started to fill in a few blanks.

Armstrong, 72, had been missing for more than two weeks, when he disappeared after going for a walk while on vacation near a New Hampshire lake. The retired IBM employee stacked hay for a Pennsylvania farmer along the way, hitched a ride to Virginia and made his way to his home state of North Carolina.

Armstrong hadn't been able to remember his name since he fell into a ravine while walking near New Hampshire's Stinson Lake on July 25, but he knew his age and thought he might know someone in Asheville. That's where he found himself in a McDonald's trying to sort things out.

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/news/worl...7702/story.html

Another good case for wearing a dogtag with your info.

Thats awesome! He came from the generation that knew how to get stuff done. Most idiots these days would just sit on a stump and stare at there cell phone. Good Job old timer!

It strikes me as an odd story to be sure. Bizarre even. If I took a spill and couldn't remember my name I think I'd probably head to a hospital or seek out the authorities. Had he done so the whole issue would have been resolved in minutes or hours. Of course, he probably wasn't in his right mind if he forgot his name.

Also odd that a farmer would offer/accept an offer of work from a older gentleman that couldn't provide his name. It was good of him to help but a phone call to authorities probably would have revealed that there was a search for him, again ending the saga quickly.

It's certainly interesting from a SAR behaviour analysis angle. This gentleman was obviously functioning well in some areas and blanking out in others. Any sort of contact with a person in a position of authority (even the telephone operator) would have resolved things very quickly.

As for the farmer: well, I'm actually tickled that there are still places in the country where it's customary to offer a hungry traveller a meal without too many questions. No doubt a gentleman of that era wouldn't accept something without offering to help out in return.

EDIT: He was only 240 miles from home when he was found. I'll bet he would have made it!

The question of name may not have come up. It's common for hikers along the Appalachian Trail to "rest" a few days at farms in return for a little work. The farmer may not have realised that the guy didn't know his own name and instead have thought it none of his business if the guy didn't want talk about personal stuff.

And it might not have seemed that unusual to the lost guy either. He's of an age where he might have done that sort of thing as a matter of course while travelling if he grew up rural. Hotels were for rich people and my dad traded work for a few days sleeping in the barn in bad weather in the 1940s. There's a glimpse of bygone rural life in the stories of the farmer's daughter and the travelling salesman in the barn....

I think the problem is that he had a workable plan - go to Asheville - and he was able to carry it out. Had he had been totally helpless he'd had been noticed or found earlier.

Good input, James. I've never done "the AT", so I'm not aware of the "house rules" of the region. All in all an interesting story, and one I'm happy to see resolved in a good way.