Franky was an OK guy. Here’s the message the unsung hero offered to Midwest woman

National Public Radio airs “My Unsung Hero,” a series of personal stories recorded by listeners who tell about someone who was unselfishly kind to them, but was never publicly recognized. If I contributed one, it would be about a night in July 1979.

After a summer course in Dublin, I landed at JFK airport in New York. Since Dad worked for American Airlines, I was “non-rev,” which means almost free, and one takes whatever flight is available. After customs, I looked for a flight home, to find there was nothing else that night from JFK. I knew I’d have to sleep in the airport; no biggie for a college student.

I collected my bag, then returned to security, which was staffed by three AA employees, packing up to leave. The airport closed at 10 p.m. This was a problem: I had $18, five English pounds, and my mother’s “emergency only” credit card on me. I called my parents collect within earshot of the crew members, who kept checking their watches.

I could tell my parents were worried, and though Mom insisted that I use the credit card to get a hotel, I had to think of something else. None of us wanted me taking a cab somewhere alone, anyway, this late. We kept discussing my limited options, and soon the security guy, who was not much older than I was, edged his way over.

“I’ll give you a ride to LaGuardia,” he said.

”Who’s that?” Dad asked. I said, “let me call you back.”

The two older employees at security were now interested, and I told them Dad was an American employee in Tulsa. Immediately, they loudly, cheerfully vouched for the “kid,” who kept saying “Look, I’m going that way, anyway.”

My parents had met and lived in New York for a few years before moving to the Midwest and having seven daughters. This offer made them nervous.

The young man said, “Get your dad on the phone. Lemme talk to him.” I made another collect call, and handed him the phone.

He introduced himself by saying, “This is Frank (Whatever),” and I could hear Mom cackle, then shout. “Frank! He’s gotta be OK!”

Dad’s name? Also, Frank.

After a minute, I got back on the phone, they said OK and to call one more time, when I was safe at LaGuardia.

I vaguely remember plunging through the guts of the airport, hopping an employee shuttle to the remote parking, the awful traffic. But we talked, and talked. He asked how I liked college (he never went), and living in the Midwest, and my family, and did I have pets, and finally we arrived at LaGuardia. It was after midnight, and I opened my wallet to try to give him the $18 or at least the souvenir English fiver, but he refused any compensation.

You might think I imagined his parting words, as if this were a movie, but I swear on my journalism degree there are some things you can’t make up.

Getting out of the car, I said, “I can’t thank you enough.”

Frank said, “Hey, just tell people we ain’t as bad in New York as everyone thinks.”

When I got inside and found a quiet spot for the night, I called my parents and told them what he said, and Dad laughed. “I’ve been saying that ever since we moved out of that hell hole!”

So Frank Whatever, the American Airlines security check-point employee in JFK’s American Airlines terminal, who went out of his way to help a stranger, has remained my unsung hero for 43 years.

Contact Ellen at murphysister04@gmail.com.

This story was originally published February 8, 2023 at 6:00 AM.