Man Sees a Dozen Soldiers Walk Into a Restaurant, So He Cuts in and Pays for All Their Meals

(Google map)

While we may imagine men and women in the U.S. military as always being somewhere else in the world, most are stationed somewhere in the United States often right next to neighboring towns and cities. They may not be deployed, yet they appreciate gestures of gratitude from the civilian population they protect all the same.

In a restaurant in Holly Pond, Alabama, a father and son, Johnny and Levi Lawrence, happened to witness a member of the public letting a large group of soldiers know that they were valued by paying for their meals.

Father and son happened to be in Jack’s restaurant in early October 2019 when a dozen hungry soldiers in uniform were piling in around breakfast time. Before the soldiers could pay for their meals, though, a dad at the popular food chain, who was with his family, cut in. “I would like to buy all of their breakfast for them,” Levi heard him tell the cashier.

Lawrence later shared the incident on Facebook. “He bought about 12 meals not including his own family’s,” he wrote. The act of generosity struck both Lawrences. Levi let his admiration be known on Facebook. “WE NEED MORE PEOPLE LIKE YOU SIR!” he wrote.

Thousands of social media users who saw the picture online agreed with his sentiments.

Many users noted the presence of the man’s son and the positive example this father was showing. One woman commented, “God bless you sir! Not just for what you did for our men and women in the military but also the example you are setting for your children.”

Jack's Restaurant in Holly Pond, Alabama (©Google map)

This is hardly an uncommon scenario among the American public who are an appreciative citizenry. A picture of a North Carolina man stepping up to treat members of the military to lunch at Chick-fil-A went viral in March 2019. The good Samaritan, in this case, Johnathan Full, was acting in memory of his late brother Joshua, who had served in the Marines. After struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder, the brother had taken his life.

Johnathan wanted to encourage any of the men who might be struggling with PTSD to seek help. A brother in the Full family, Stephen, who took the pictures, wrote in a Facebook post that it had started off with Johnathan paying for just two soldiers’ meals, yet “little did he know, about 9 more walked in lol. He didn’t even bat an eye and asked everyone in line to allow the 9 to come to the front of the line.”

Illustration - Shutterstock | Bumble Dee

The Full brothers happened to have their sons with them and used it as an opportunity to teach them about gratitude to people in the military.

As one commenter noted, “I don’t think enough people realize that these military people sign on the dotted line to lay down their lives for us—all of us. How many of us would do that?”