Boy's moral compass set on honesty

SouthFlorida.com ^ | January 17 2005 | Ted Gregory

[Willie Green]

He is a model airplane and tank builder, Boy Scout and Yu-Gi-Oh! enthusiast.

Now, Andrew Gieseler is something else: a role model.

While walking to the door of a Super Target store in Warrenville on Saturday, Andrew, 12, found a plastic bag stuffed with $9,000 on a deserted stretch of sidewalk. A routine trip to buy sneakers to accommodate his growing feet suddenly became exciting and mysterious.

He picked up the bag and read the two white stickers on it, one specifying the amount; the other stating the bill denominations.

"We could see it was money and I said, `What do you think we should do?' " his mother, Mary Gieseler, said of their surprise. "He said, `We should bring it inside.' "

[vpintheak]

Target needs all the good publicity they can get.

[CROSSHIGHWAYMAN]

If nobody claims the bag of cash, give it to the kid!

[TXnMA]

When I read that he was a Scout, I wasn't the least bit surprised at his action. If no one claims it, give it to his Boy Scout troop -- so they can continte to teach solid moral behavior to lots of boys (who may not have moms as honest as this one).

[lowbridge]

It remains unclear exactly to whom the money belongs. A truck from United Armored had made a pickup minutes before the Gieselers parked their van at Target about 9:30 a.m. But the cash in the bag was not from the retailer's receipts, a Target spokeswoman said.

Andrew said he thought he saw a Glen Ellyn address on the bag. Efforts to reach United Armored officials Sunday were unsuccessful.

Target isn't concerned with that detail. It is more impressed with "his sense of right," corporate spokeswoman Paula Thornton-Greear said.

The retailer is going to call Andrew and "thank him in some appropriate manner," Thornton-Greear said.

"thank him in some appropriate manner"? I get the feeling that Target wont give the kid back the 9 thousand if no one comes forth to claim it.

[Shisan]

Give him a free membership to Free Republic.

[JRandomFreeper]

'Do only right. This will gratify some and astonish the rest.'

/john

[notaliberal]

A single mother???? hummm... And a child with a moral compass? That doesn't coincide with the MSM view of single parenthood.

[Nuzcruizer]

Good thing a one of those pierced, smelly drug addicted democrats Or John Kerry didn't find it, or all we would have in print is a add in the lost and found column