Veteran's life touched by Midas Granbury

James Farrell, a former Marine, was the recipient of a red 2009 Chevy Silverado pickup on Aug. 21, through Midas Granbury’s Project Spark program.

“We buy vehicles that are probably too expensive to repair, and then we get vendors to donate parts, we donate the labor, we get it fixed and then we donate the truck. This particular one (was given) to a vet who doesn't have a way to get to work anymore,” said Robert Rangel, owner of Midas Granbury.

Cowtown Warriors — an organization based out of Fort Worth dedicated to assisting local wounded and disabled veterans — donated a substantial amount of money to the project. The Cowtown Warriors board also picked Farrell to be the recipient of the truck.

Farrell enlisted in the Marines in 2004, and served the country stationed in Okinawa, Japan. His duties included loading and unloading the ships for float deployments.

During his floats, he cross-trained with the Filipino Marines, the South Korean Marines, the Thai Marines and the Australian military doing various training exercises in which he became a part of the helicopter support team.

He was transferred to Camp Pendleton, where his job entailed making sure the Marines and sailors were up to date on all of their training.

Now that Farrell has a method of transportation, he can now take care of basic needs and look for employment.

“With this vehicle, I’ll finally be able to call the employers back to schedule a job interview so I can, once again, become a productive member of society,” he said. “I absolutely love it. It’s gorgeous. It’s a dream come true.”

“I’m happy that we’re giving back to a Marine. I think this is a great truck for him. He’s got his service dog. He can put him in the back,” Rangel said.

Farrell said the first thing he planned to do for his service dog, Sarge, after receiving the truck was to “take him for a ride, let him hang out the window and maybe go fishing.”

Before Rangel could even give the truck to Farrell, another vehicle was donated to the shop to put in the Project Spark program. He said he hopes to continue giving away vehicles to those in need.

“We’ll be doing another one here in the near future,” he said. “We hope to make it as regular as possible, but we have to wait for the vehicles to become available. As they come available, we’re gonna keep doing it.”

He said he has had an “incredible response from the Granbury community” as people are “happy to help and contribute.”

“I've owned the business for almost two years, and my wife and I have two little ones — a two-month-old and a two-year-old — so we're really trying to dig in and become part of the community here,” Rangel said. “We really enjoy where we live and enjoy having a small business here. We're trying to meet people and network and give back to the community and it's been great. This has been like a godsend project for us because we've got so many great people that have been just jumping to do something like this. They just needed something to be a part of.”

Rangel said he believes in veterans who are hard-working and simply trying to create a better life for themselves, their family and their community.

“This is one way that I can give back,” he said. “I personally haven't served in the military, but my cousin served in Afghanistan and came back disabled. My mom gave her entire career as a psychologist at the VA. She was even the chief of psychology for a while helping veterans with PTSD. I just personally haven't been able to give back to veterans yet, so it's kind of exciting to finally be able to do something to start giving back to vets myself, personally.”