Two months after David died, his wife, Lori, found some paperwork he had squirreled away about his 2006 Lexus RX330. It was a notice from the manufacturer promising to replace the vehicle’s dashboard, which over the years had developed unsightly cracks. This was a problem common to a whole crop of Lexuses.
The letter said the offer would expire in 2017. Preoccupied as he was, David had never seen to it and more good news: “Ourisman of Rockville took care of the $400,” Ely said.
Ely Shell had been his son’s biggest supporter during his cancer fight, researching the disease, seeking out cutting-edge treatments, driving him back and forth to chemotherapy. Now he girded to do battle with Lexus.
But he didn’t have to. He took the notice to Ourisman Lexus of Rockville, where the car was purchased, and met with the service director, Matt Reid. The wording on the document was unequivocal — it had expired — but Matt said he’d see what he could do. He talked to his bosses and then got in touch with Lexus.
Lexus said the offer was over, but they agreed to give Ely a $1,000 credit to use at Ourisman. That would go a long way toward the $1,400 cost of installing a new dashboard.
David’s 17-year-old daughter, Samantha — Ely’s granddaughter — has just started taking driving lessons in her dad’s car.
Said Ely: “Usually, people call and b—- and moan about dealers,” Ely said. “This guy Matt Reid, he was unbelievable. That’s all I can tell you.”
Thanked for his service
Arnold Malhmood got a nice surprise the other day. The Rockville dentist — and U.S. Air Force veteran (1959 to 1963) — stopped for breakfast with his wife, Diane, at the First Watch cafe in Gaithersburg, Md.
“I was wearing my USAF cap and halfway through our meal the waitress came over to tell me that someone had paid for our meal,” wrote Arnold. “What a surprise and proof that patriotism is not dead.”
“There was also such an organization amongst African Americans in Washington, D.C.,” he wrote.
This Helping Hand Club was founded in 1907 by members of the Nineteenth Street Baptist Church. Among its active participants was Nannie Helen Burroughs, the African American educator and civil rights activist and founder of the National Training School for Women and Girls.
The club was a philanthropic organization that also hosted speakers, including such figures as author and historian Carter G. Woodson, Howard University President Mordecai Johnson and Rep. Helen Gahagan Douglas of California.
Jackson wrote that the Helping Hand Club originally was for Nineteenth Baptist members only. But, as a 1948 club history put it: “Because of the continued pleas of members of other churches and denominations, the doors of the club were opened to admit them.”
The club continues to be active. In 2018, it sponsored a Black History Month program, raised money for scholarships and delivered food baskets to the needy.
Our Helping Hand bears no relation beyond the name and the sentiment: to help others. On this day of thanks, I hope you’ll consider making a donation to one of the groups that we’re supporting: Bright Beginnings, a preschool for children from homeless families; N Street Village, a charity that works with homeless women; and So Others Might Eat, which feeds and provides homes to thousands of needy Washingtonians.
