Stan Hilton was killed instantly in a car wreck today. Stan is a very good friend and an Elder in JBC. Stan is Gordon Hilton’s cousin and they were in business together for year’s. 35 or 40 years ago Stan and Gordan and I used to go duck hunting together. We would put my drift boat in the Willamette river at the Talbot/ Buena Vista Ferry and drift down to Independence and take out there. We would dead drift the boat and jump shoot ducks as we drifted by them and they would fly up. Stan decided that we would kill more ducks if we would use decoys and sit in a slew only a 10 minute drift down the river from where we put in. So we did that and we shot about a dozen ducks and headed back upriver to the boat ramp. Shortly after we got going we hit a tree under the water and sheared the pin on the prop. Stan didn’t have a spare pin in the boat so we had no choice but to drift down to Independence. It was just getting dark when we sheared the outboard motor pin so we drifted the next two hours in the pitch dark with one oar and no flashlight. Stan’s boat was a small 12 ft boat, and we had it loaded down with decoys, there were three of us and a black lab dog in the boat and it had about 6 inches of freeboard. Did I mention that there had been a lot of rain and the river was at flood stage. Did I also mention that the week before another boat with guys duck hunting like us had capsized and that two of the hunters drowned. We had two fears as we drifted down the river, the first was that we would not be able to recognize or see the boat ramp and drift right by it, and the second was that we would hit one of the pylons of the bridge coming into Independence and capsize the boat. As we headed into Independence we heard the roar of the water going around the pylons and we were scared out of our heads. Well, we made it to the boat ramp and got back to my house around midnight. Sometime that next week Stan trusted Christ as his personal savior, and both Gordon and I figured it was our scaring him to death that prompted him to take care of his eternal life destiny. Stan is in heaven with Jesus right now and I look forward to seeing him again when I get there.