During a rain-soaked week in mid-March, the homebuilding angels from ABC's Extreme Makeover Home Edition descended upon small Berry, Kentucky, in Harrison County to help change the lives of a family in need.

In doing so, Ty Pennington and his crew called upon Lexington's Radden Painting and Decorating to add color to the latest dream-come-true for an episode that aired Easter Sunday.

"It's like I always say at home - damn, this show makes me cry every time. You just can't help it. I looked around at all these construction workers with hardhats on and there weren't too many dry eyes," said Tom Radden, Jr., the company's president of personally watching the Hassalls get their first glimpse of their new home. "If you've ever seen the show, you know when they pull that bus away and the expressions on their faces and their reactions, that's what you've worked for."

The 3,200-square-foot house was built for Brian Hassall, a police officer who was shot in the line of duty and though able to return to work, because of migraine headaches prompted by sunshine, he's only able to work nights. When at home, he spends most of his time in the dim basement, where he cannot be joined by his wife, Michelle, who's battling a rare blood disorder and lymphoma. Those conditions have left her immune system too susceptible to becoming sick for her to venture into their damp basement, according to the show. Mounting medical bills made it impossible for Michelle, a teacher in the area, and Brian to make needed changes to their house so they can spend time with their two adopted children at the same time. That's where ABC's Sunday night feel-good family program comes in, with a little help from some Central Kentucky businesses.

Radden and project manager John Collins, Jr., said they jumped at the chance to participate in the project although they weren't given much time to mull the decision, having been asked to participate a week before the Hassalls' house was to be razed.

Radden and Collins convened a quick powwow to determine how many guys to put on the job and which paying customers would be amenable to losing part of their painting crew for a couple of days for the good deed. A house the size of the Hassalls' would normally call for a crew of two to four to coat the walls, but most projects don't have to be completed in 36 hours, so Radden and Collins drafted 12 of their best men for the job.

"Keep in mind while we were painting, you've got carpenters sawing and putting woodwork up, you've got cabinet guys doing their thing, you've got electricians running wire, you've got tile people in the bathroom doing tile, so it's everybody in there at the same time," Radden said. "Amazingly enough, everybody worked together; there was no bickering or fighting. If the carpenter needed to put his stair spindles up, you'd get out of his way and let him do his thing, then you paint behind him."

Though the working crews, which numbered well over 100 in the house at a time, were congenial, Collins said, "There was a lot of cheek turning, if you know what I mean."

This was by no means a common project, according to Collins, who received updates throughout the weekend as to when the house would be ready for paint on Monday. The crew was originally scheduled to arrive on the site Monday morning to begin covering the walls, but early into the weekend the project was running four hours behind schedule, thanks in large part to a constant torrent of rain. After that, updates from the job site were sparse as the downpours ruined contractors' phones.

Fortunately, Collins was able to get the orders for the daunting 44 colors of paint before contact was knocked out. With help from his rep at Porter Paints, who donated the paint, all 44 colors we ready to be spread by noon. Unfortunately the house wasn't, as more backups began to mount.

"It was 6 or 7 o'clock when we all got there. Porter Paints was there with a van full of paint, we had all our guys, all our equipment, and it started pouring down rain again and we all got soaked," Radden said. "The guys were ready to go like a football game, you know - go in and do their thing."

As wet as the crew was standing in the rain, the drywall they needed to paint was wetter. A house with more than 100 people packed inside during constant rain is not conductive to a humidity level ideal for drying mud on dry wall.

Monday morning turned into Tuesday morning for the paint crew as Collins and one other stayed overnight to help the drywall workers finish their part of the job so the paint could get rolling at dawn.

"We met here at 5 a.m.," Radden said at his office. "John was still at the house - he spent the night, he had glassy eyes. Our crew was ready to go, and by that time it was ready to paint so we started putting the paint on."

All told, the crew put in more than 350 man-hours on the house, and got the walls covered and complete by the evening. Unfortunately, continuing problems with the drywall meant they weren't done.

"They called me at 12:30 a.m. on Wednesday," Collins said. "I thought they were kidding. They said they had a lot of drywall touchups, and we might want to come by tomorrow and do some little touchup. So Wednesday morning, Tom and I talked, and we didn't think we had to take that many people back up there, just a couple… I went up there and called Tom back, and we had to repaint the whole house."

Though the Radden crew had to cover the house twice with paint, Collins said his time away from the site reinforced why they were doing it.

"Anybody you talk to in that community that knew these people, all said they deserved it. It wasn't just that they were having a hard time - even through that, they donated a lot of time to different organizations, and not only the school and the church but other things in the community," Collins said. "I heard this at Speedway talking to a clerk. She saw me all muddy and she asked me (if I was part of the crew working on the house). She told me all the things that Ms. Hassall had done for her kids in choir class at school, above and beyond what was required of her."

Seeing the family's faces as the bus was moved to unveil their new home, where they could once again live as a family, was worth all the hard work and lost time on paying jobs, Radden said.

"We went from not sure we could pull it off to really glad that we did, and we really felt honored that we were a part of it. It did put us behind on some of our regular jobs, but our customers were really great about the whole thing, and all of the men from our crew that worked on it were just tickled to death to do it. It was a good experience."

When asked if they would do it again, Radden said, "That pretty much was our ad budget for the year," but he probably wouldn't turn down the opportunity to help another family.

Apr 21, 2006