Even though Walter Carr's vehicle broke down the night before his first day on the job with a moving company, he was determined to show his dedication. And now that dedication has been rewarded with his CEO's personal car.Carr started walking at midnight to be sure he'd get to his first assignment, according to a Facebook post by Jenny Hayden Lamey, whose family he was helping to move.The determined employee made it from Homewood, just outside Birmingham, to Pelham, nearly 20 miles away, all on foot. In Pelham, police officers spotted him.After hearing his story, the officers took him out to breakfast before dropping him off at Lamey's home. He was still the first to arrive of all nine Bellhops employees assigned to help with the move. In her Facebook post, Lamey reflected on what a great experience she'd had and on how humble Carr was when receiving praise from the officers, his coworkers and Lamey's family. "I just can't tell you how touched I was by Walter and his journey. He is humble and kind and cheerful and he had big dreams!" Lamey wrote in her Facebook post. "I am in total awe of this young man! "Lamey wrote that she was further inspired by Carr after learning that he is a Marine and that he moved to the area after he and his mother lost their New Orleans home in Hurricane Katrina.As for Carr, he said he was just trying to prove that he cared about his job. "I wanted to show them that I have the dedication, and that I always have in my life and that I am going to get to this job one way or the other," he told WBMA . Carr said that if he tells people that if they think his journey was far, "then come walk in my shoes, because my shoe was really killing me that day. "Lamey's post made the rounds on social media and caught the attention of Luke Marklin, the CEO of Bellhops. On Monday, just three days after the 20-mile trek, Marklin made the trip down from the company's Tennessee headquarters to meet Carr. Marklin then handed Carr the keys to his own Ford Escape. "I'd like to give you this car right here. Today. Like right now. Like you can drive away with it," Marklin said.Carr reacted to the surprise with shock and awe. After the emotional day, Lamey wrote in another post on Facebook that she considers Carr a role model of how to overcome hard days. "That walk Walter made has brought him into the hearts and homes and businesses of thousands of Americans all across the country," she wrote. "He gives us hope and courage and renews our faith in the resiliency of the human spirit."<doc-sep>We've all seen the amazing story shared by Jenny about one of our bellhops, Walter Carr, but many have asked if we have any video from the moment CEO @LukeMarklin thanked Walter for the perseverance he demonstrated on his first day w/ @BellhopsMoving #TheWorldNeedsMoreWalters pic.twitter.com/mXrvI2JQoP<doc-sep>Walter Carr sent his friends a flurry of increasingly pleading text messages. The college student's car had broken down, and he was supposed to begin his new job as a mover the next morning -- at a home 20 miles from his apartment near Birmingham, Ala. He struck out finding a ride, but he wasn't about to miss his first day of work at a moving company called Bellhops. Carr, 20, needed the work. He mulled his predicament and concluded there was only one option: He would walk it. "I sat there and I thought, 'How can I get to my job? What streets would I walk through? How long would take me to get there?' " he said in an interview with The Washington Post. He searched the route from his apartment in Homewood to the house in Pelham, and according to Google Maps, it would take eight hours on foot. As a former high school cross-country runner, he knew he could do it in less. Carr ate a meal of bologna and eggs at 8 p.m. and took a nap. At midnight, he woke up, grabbed his wallet, phone, a baseball and a kitchen knife to protect him from stray dogs. He headed out into the dark. "I've always been that person who figured things out on my own," Carr said. "I went out walking." (function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(d.getElementById(id))return;js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src='https://embed.playbuzz.com/sdk.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}(document,'script','playbuzz-sdk')); A few hours in, he did come across a dog. He threw the ball. The dog ran after it. Carr went the other way. On the trek, Carr had the route mapped out in his mind. He jogged some. He walked a lot. When his legs began to burn, he stayed focused on his goal. "I was just thinking about my route, how I was going to get there in the time frame I needed to," Carr said. He'd had jobs in the past as a cook at fast-food restaurants, but this paid better, and he needed the money for an apartment he'd recently rented. At 2 a.m. he passed the city of Hoover. Around 4 a.m. he reached Pelham, but he still had hours more to walk to get to the house. He was about to enter the highway ramp, the most direct route to the job. He sat down in a bank parking lot. "I decided I'd rest for a minute because my legs were killing me," he said. A police car pulled up and the officer, identified by the news site AL.com as Mark Knighten, asked if Carr was all right. Carr said yes, and explained what he was doing. "I said, 'This is crazy but I'm actually heading to work. It's my first day in the job,' " Carr recalled. The officer asked him when he last ate, and Carr told him about the bologna and eggs. Knighten offered to take him to get something more in his stomach. "I said, 'I just paid my rent. I have no cash on me at all,' " Carr recalled. Knighten told him to get in the car, the meal was on him. They went to Whataburger with some other officers, and Carr ordered a chicken biscuit. At the urging of the officers, he ordered another one, he said. Knighten drove Carr a few miles toward his job and dropped him at a church, saying it was a safe place to be. Knighten had to leave because of a shift change, but he said another officer would be by in a few hours to check on Carr, and perhaps give him a ride to work. But after Carr got to the church, he became concerned he might not make it on time. So around 5:30, he started walking again. Carr was walking on a two-lane road, and sure enough, a police officer came up and said he'd heard about him. That officer, identified by AL.com as Scott Duffey, drove Carr the last four miles to his job. At 6:30 a.m., Duffey walked up to the house where Carr was supposed to meet the other movers for the job, and explained to homeowner Jenny Lamey what had happened. "The officer told me, 'I've got this nice kid in my car. He's a great kid, he's been walking all night to get to your house,' " Lamey said. "That's when the tears started coming. I just started crying." Carr came to the door and Lamey offered him a bed to take a nap, and some food. Carr replied, " 'No, I'd rather get started,' " Lamey said. The other two movers from Bellhops showed up shortly after, and the three of them moved the Lameys across town to their new house. Everyone got along as if they were old friends, Carr and Lamey said. After the move, Carr played basketball with the Lameys' sons, ages 11, 13 and 16. Lamey said she has no idea how he had the energy for it. "I can't imagine what kept him going," Lamey said. "What came over him physically was supernatural. I think God helped him through." Lamey said this is just the beginning of what she hopes is a long friendship between Carr and her family. "He's such a humble, kindhearted person," she said. "He's really incredible. He said it was the way he was raised. Nothing is impossible unless you say it's impossible." One of Carr's new co-workers gave him a ride home. The following day, Lamey called Carr's supervisor, and the two cried together on the phone about what Carr had done. Lamey posted the story on Facebook, and it took off. She started a GoFundMe with a goal of $2,000 to help him with his car troubles. As of Wednesday morning, it had raised more than $37,000. Lamey said all the money will go to Carr, and a financial adviser has volunteered to help him manage it. On Sunday, Carr's boss, Bellhops chief executive Luke Marklin, called to thank him. Marklin said he wanted to meet him in person to show his appreciation. They agreed to meet Monday at a coffee shop near Carr's apartment. Carr walked the 20 minutes there. When they met, Marklin gave him his own car, a 2014 Ford Escape. He said it would be in better hands with Carr than with him. "We set a really high bar for heart and grit and . . . you just blew it away," Marklin told him. Carr has gotten a lot of attention in the past few days for his almost 20-mile trek. He said it's been surprising, but he feels good sharing it. "The lesson of my story is it's great to reach people, I always wanted to inspire people," he said. "Don't let nobody tell you you can't do something. It's up to us whether we can."<doc-sep>
After a viral Facebook post, a CEO gave a college student, Walter Carr, his personal Ford as a thank you for walking 20 miles to get to work on time CEO Gifts His Car to College Student Who Walked 20 Miles to Work — See the Emotional Video Good things come to those who walk! A 20-year-old Alabama student is experiencing good karma after making a nearly 7-hour journey on foot to ensure he wasn’t late for his first day of work, according to USA Today. In a Facebook post that has since gone viral, Jenny Lamey explained that she and her husband had hired company Bellhops to assist them in their move last weekend. Around 6:30 a.m. local time on their moving day, Lamey said a police officer rang their door. “He proceeded to tell us that he had picked up ‘this nice kid’ in Pelham early this morning,” wrote Lamey. ” ‘This nice kid,’ Walter, said that he was supposed to help us with our move today. It was his first day on the job with this moving company (Bellhops) and he was ‘training’ today.” Walter Carr’s 2003 Nissan had broken down the night before his first day, according to USA Today. After being unable to find a backup option, Carr decided to walk, leaving Homewood to head toward Lamey’s home in Pelham — 20 miles away — around midnight, the outlet reported. “I wanted to beat the crew members there to let the company know how dedicated I am,” Carr told USA Today. Around 4 a.m., after Carr had already walked 14 miles, police officers stopped him on the side of the road, USA Today reported. When he told recounted his story — “It’s going to sound real crazy, but I’m actually headed to work!” he recalled to the outlet — the officers took him to breakfast. The officers dropped him off at a nearby church so he could rest before starting the last four miles of his trek. Before he could get too far, another officer — who had heard about Carr — gave him a ride to his final destination, USA Today reported. Lamey wrote that Carr refused to rest before getting to work, and eventually divulged some of his backstory to her. Carr was a Marine, and had lost his home in Hurricane Katrina, relocating to Alabama with his mother after the disaster. Awed by his dedication, Lamey started a GoFundMe to raise money for Carr to get a new vehicle, and posted the Facebook message. “He’s such a humble, kindhearted person,” she told the Washington Post. “He’s really incredible. He said it was the way he was raised. Nothing is impossible unless you say it’s impossible.” Soon, Bellhops CEO Luke Marklin got wind of Carr’s story, writing on Twitter, “I’m really proud to be on the same team as Walter … Look forward to thanking him in person this week.” Marklin met Carr on Monday, and surprised him with a special thank you gift: his own Ford. In video of the moment, Marklin told an emotional Carr, “I couldn’t think of a better way to part ways with this and put it to better use.” “It was wonderful to get to know him,” Marklin told USA Today. “His resolve to get through challenges is just something that legends are made of… I don’t think Walter… was ever going to let not having a car get him down.” When asked about the reaction to his journey, Carr told the outlet he “couldn’t believe it. I didn’t think that 20-mile walk would mean anything to anybody.”