A little girl's letter to her father's boss.

Byline: Bob Welch The Register-Guard

Ed Read, operations manager at Oregon Motorcoach Center, felt a lump in his throat. He didn't get many letters like this.

A child's handwriting on notebook paper. In capital letters across the top: "PLEASE HIRE HIM." And handed to him by one of the 22 workers at the company on Airport Way that refurbishes motor homes.

The letter had been found in the lunch box of a guy named Andy Hess, who had been doing odd jobs for the company - a little body work here, a little painting there.

"Dear Ed Reed," it began.

"Please give my Dad a job at Oregon Motorcoach. He has been out of a job since December 2008 and he deserves this job and you deserve such a great painter, he has a great painting skill. He has painted cars, coaches and he always has a good attitude about what he has to do. He has always been a good Dad, painter and lovely husband and friend. If you hire him you would be getting a good deal and a lot of new customers for life. My Dad has never been rude to anyone so you won't have to worry about having meetings with him. So please, please, please hire him. He always has great ideas at meetings and never needs an assistant.

"Sincerely, Cheyenne Hess."

Read called his wife Nancy, the office manager. "You gotta see this," he said.

Nancy wasn't halfway through when she began sniffling.

As we begin this Thanksgiving week, Cheyenne's letter reminds us that, amid a slumping economy, there is still wonder in the world. In this case, in the heart of a 12-year-old girl, a seventh-grader at Prairie Mountain School in west Eugene.

Her father, Andy, 43, had lost his job as a painter when Country Coach went out of business last December. By spring, the family was selling stuff to stay afloat, though Andy's wife - and Cheyenne's mom - Melissa, 38, still had her job as service and parts manager at what was then Kendall Hyundai.

In the weeks to come, Andy's unemployment would trickle to an end. He started checking with Ed Read about a full-time job.

Sorry, not now, Read told him.

Andy would come home in the evenings and Cheyenne would race out to meet him. "Did they hire you, Dad? Did they? Did they?"

He continued to do sporadic work for the company. Cheyenne kept asking. "Did they hire you, Dad? Did they?"

One late June morning, Andy got up, packed his lunch box for work, then took the dog for a walk. When he returned he noticed the light on in Cheyenne's room. Strange, he thought. What's she up to?

Later, on his morning break, he saw the note that had been tucked next to his sandwich.

"When I read it I got all choked up," he says. "It's still hard for me to talk about. You don't think of seventh-graders worrying about what goes on with their moms and dads and yet here she is, worried about me. She's just an awesome kid."

He showed the letter to some friends at work but not to Ed Read. "I didn't want to put him on the spot," he says.

Turns out, however, that Ed Read and Cheyenne were on the same page. Read called Andy into his office on July 6. "Andy, you've been working here about a month," he said. "Might as well just hire you full time."

Andy was, in his words, "overjoyed. It's great working here."

And great going home to Cheyenne and Melissa, as he did the day he heard the news.

"Did they hire you, Dad?" asked Cheyenne. "Did they? Did they?"

"I start Monday, full time," he said.

Followed by tears from all three for a little girl's dream come true.

Epilogue: Andy Hess is still a full-time service technician at Oregon Motorcoach. Melissa works for Kendall Toyota. And Cheyenne's letter, which Andy showed Read a few days after he was hired, is still sitting in his boss's top basket. Says Read: "I'll always keep it."

Bob Welch is at 338-2354 and [e-mail].