Somerset County Neighbors Unite Again for a Friend in Need

Make Whopping 5,600 Bales of
Hay in One Day for Cancer Survivor

Sandra Lepley
Southwestern Pa. Correspondent

MEYERSDALE, Pa. — For the second time in the past year, neighbors from Larimer Township united together to help a neighbor in need.

Last Saturday, more than 100 workers from rural, southern Somerset County communities dropped their own work to help Richard “Dick” Sines, 52, who has recently been diagnosed with brain cancer and had surgery in May for a tumor.

“They came out to help us when they could have been at home getting their own hay crops in,” said Sines, who has a construction business and also operates a small beef farm with his wife Kathy at his home farm off Kennell Lane. “It’s unbelievable that so many people would do something like this and it goes to show how people can pull together.”

Sines said that you never know when something like cancer can strike and it changes the way a person looks at life. He himself and his son, Bill, and other members of his family took time last year on Labor Day to help their neighbor, Johnny Urbas, who had a stroke due to a hole in his heart.

“I felt so great about helping Johnny last year,” said Sines. “I would have never thought it could have been me but you never know when something might happen. That’s why friends are so important in life.”

On Saturday, Urbas had a chance to return the favor for his friend. While Urbas now takes medication for his heart condition, it didn’t stop him from driving one of many red tractors with a baler behind, starting early and ending after 5 p.m. to harvest over 5,600 small square bales of hay into Sines’ barn.

Another friend and neighbor, David Crissinger Sr., was mostly responsible for organizing this event as he was last year for the Labor Day haymaking at the Urbas farm. David Sr., his wife, Debbie, and son, David Jr., have a dairy farm within view of the Sines’ property.

After Sines was first diagnosed and then had surgery for the brain tumor on May 27, he didn’t think his family would have a corn crop this year let alone worry about the haymaking. But Dave Crissinger got a group together in June to bale and wrap big bales from the first crop, then later plant the corn after dark a few evenings, and then return last week to mow the hay for Saturday’s event.

“We never know what’s going to happen in life,” said Crissinger. “Everyone came out to help because they wanted to show their concern and support this family. I’ve known these people all my life and we knew they needed some help. We never thought twice about it.”

Several tractors, some red and some green, baled the hay, while several others took hay wagons back and forth from six fields full of dry hay. Back at the barn, workers unloaded the hay from the wagon onto the elevator and piled it into the hay mile. It was like watching a beehive with constant activity.

Even at a side garage, more than 20 women and children were constantly working to help prepare a meal afterwards. In the Sines family alone, there were over 30 people in attendance and other community members from Pocahontas, Glencoe and Wellersburg areas were there in numbers. Several men and their sons from the Amish community also came on the backs of pickup trucks to help.

“No one complained even though baling hay is a hard job,” said Sines. “It all comes down to family and in a small community like this, we are all family.”

Sines has been undergoing radiation and chemotherapy and he is also part of a clinical trial through the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Md.

He and his wife Kathy have been married 34 years and have three grown children and three grandchildren. Their children are Julie Sarver, Buffalo Mills; Lee of Emporium; and William “Bill” Sines of Salisbury. He is the son of Doris and Jerry Kennell and the late Arnold “Buck” Sines.

“It seems like people are so busy these days and they don’t have time for much of anything,” said Sines. “But, everyone dropped their own work and put my family ahead of themselves. That’s true friendship and that’s what is important in life. I can’t say thank you enough.”