rethink possible. captioning funded by cbs and ford >> simon: it looks like we lost a war. it could be dresden after the allied bombing. factories, stores, schools left to rot. houses gutted by fire. streets abandoned, derelict, populated by crime. it turns dark after dusk because 40% of the streetlights don't work. tonight, you will see what a great american city looks like when it has gone bankrupt. >> safer: this is jack andraka, age 15, as he beats out 1,500 contestants, and wins $100,000 prize at the intel international challenge fair invention.

>> this could save lives. >> it is not every day you get an e-mail from a 15-year-old that comes with a detailed protocol with let's see what else, let's see where this goes. >> stahl: it is the story that has never been told. there were 105 in all, john riordon risking his own life, rescued in the last days of the vietnam war. even now, four decades later, when they see him, you know, they know he is the reason they are alive. >> thank you. >> stahl: and they call him "papa." how many grandchildren do you have? >> i keep using the number 105. but the grandchildren, don't ask me. >> i'm steve kroft. >> i'm lesley stahl. >> i'm morley safer. >> i'm bob simon. >> i'm lara logan. >> i'm scott pelley.

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look for it on subway fresh fit meals like the classic subway club and the freshly-made double chicken chopped salad. subway. eat fresh. >> simon: few cities have provided more to more americans than detroit. when it filed for bankruptcy in july, it became the largest american city to do that and admit defeat. it wasn't a sudden blow-- a hurricane or a tornado. detroit's decline was more than 50 years in the making. what happened? people will tell you any number of things.

they're all true, and they're all linked-- the decline of the auto industry, race riots, a mass exodus, corruption, bad management, and bad luck. the end result-- $18.5 billion of debt that detroit can't pay. the bankruptcy filing just confirms what residents had known for years-- the city that was once an industrial capital of america had hit rock bottom. but there are those who believe that you've got to get there before you can rise again, before you can reinvent yourself. but we begin with what an american city looks like when it has gone bankrupt. it looks like it has lost a war. it could be dresden after the allied bombing. factories, stores, schools left to rot. houses gutted by fire. streets abandoned, derelict, populated by crime. it turns dark after dusk because 40% of the street lights don't work. the buses don't run on time.

the cops don't come in time, if they come at all-- they're understaffed. and if your house is burning, even when firemen get there, they might not have what it takes to do much about it. detroit has long been a playground for arsonists, yet during a decade of massive budget deficits, the city has lost a third of its cops, a third of its firefighters. fire companies have been shut down. equipment that has broken down doesn't always get fixed. the firefighters at ladder 22 told us everything on their rig is in pretty good shape-- everything, that is, except the tank that's supposed to hold their water. jonathan frendewey told us it's leaking. now, how long have you had this leak? >> jonathan frendewey: the leak's been going on for... probably a year we've been reporting it. within the last six months, we stopped filling the tank because it's leaking so bad that, by the time we get somewhere, we're out of water anyway. >> simon: which happened recently when frendewey and

jeremy mullins responded to a car fire. >> jeremy mullins: when we got to that car fire, the only option we had to stop this car from spreading to the house was a garden hose, was the neighbor's garden hose. problem is... is that that's just not adequate. that car fire turned into a house fire. it spread up the wall and into the house. >> simon: so the occupants were out there watching their house burn down? >> frendewey: yeah. >> mullins: i don't know why there aren't people banging down city hall right now, saying, "why is my firehouse closed? why is this firehouse closed?" >> simon: they're resigned to it. they just...? >> mullins: i believe that people in the city have lived with it this way for so long that maybe they don't understand that this isn't how it's supposed to be. >> simon: schools are supposed to be safe places, but this one is abandoned, and camille rhymes says it has become a safe house for criminals. she lives across the street with her children, and wasn't surprised when, after spotting intruders in her yard and calling the cops, she waited... and called again...

and waited. and how long is it between your first call and the cops arrival here? >> camille rhymes: anywhere between two and three hours. >> simon: you say that very calmly as if... >> rhymes: i mean, because that's normal. i've called the cops and it took them up to six hours to come. so, i think if you not screaming that you dying and somebody killing you right then and there, they not going to rush to get to you. >> simon: and even if they did, detroit is huge-- 139 square miles, enough space to contain boston, san francisco and manhattan. some 80,000 buildings abandoned. but drive a few minutes from the desolation, and you're in another city, another world. clean streets, classy architecture, nice places to grab lunch, an oasis of activity-- hardly what comes to mind when you think "bankruptcy." this is downtown detroit, and its renaissance is largely due to one man. you look out the window, it looks pretty good. >> dan gilbert: yeah, it's not what bankruptcy looks like, huh?

>> simon: that man is dan gilbert, born in detroit, and the founder and chairman of quicken loans, the third largest mortgage provider in the country. it made him a fortune. he's invested more than a billion dollars here, buying and renovating buildings in the city's central core. which of the buildings we're looking at are yours? >> gilbert: the first national building over here is ours. the chase building... and then, the one there near the river, one woodward. >> simon: he got them at what he calls a "skyscraper sale." what did you pay for them? >> gilbert: not a lot. ( laughs ) not a lot. >> simon: have any numbers? >> gilbert: you know, we paid for a lot of these office buildings less than what you would pay for one year's rent per foot in new york city. >> simon: are you doing what's good for detroit or what's good for you? >> gilbert: i know that sometimes there's hollywood movies that, you know, describe every investor and profit-making capitalist as somebody very greedy. but in our case, i think it's doing well by doing good.

and i think that fits very nicely together. >> simon: some think of him as doing for detroit what carnegie did for pittsburgh, what rockefeller did for new york. dan gilbert is the second largest private landowner here, behind only general motors. but it's not land that is in short supply; it's people. the city has lost nearly two- thirds of its population-- more than a million residents, most of them white-- over the last 60 years. >> ( cheering ) so, three years ago, gilbert moved his company's headquarters from the suburbs to downtown. >> gilbert: welcome to detroit, everybody! >> simon: he has filled his buildings with more than 10,000 of his own employees, offers them subsidies to live here, sometimes even a ride to work. and to make them feel safe in a place with the highest violent crime rate of any major city in the country, he set up this security command center, which monitors some 300 cameras looking downtown. >> gilbert: whenever we're engaged, we want to make sure our people-- we have 10,00 of

them down here-- are safe and sound. >> simon: so far, gilbert has managed to lure more than 90 companies here, including chrysler, which never had an office downtown before. now, he wants to build a tech town on the ruins of what was once motor city. this old theater was abandoned for 25 years. twitter now has an office here, as do more than 20 internet start-ups that have all gotten seed money from gilbert. what's the pitch you give to companies to move here and for people to move here? >> gilbert: "you can impact the outcome in detroit." and that sells. it's crazy, but it sells. here, you can actually see what you do affect a great american city, and its hopefully historical comeback. >> simon: you walk around downtown, you see what you've renovated, and one becomes optimistic. but the border comes very suddenly, doesn't it...? >> gilbert: mm-hmm. >> simon: ...between downtown, which is looking good, and the rest of detroit. >> gilbert: there's no big city in the world that i can think of that has strong neighborhoods and a weak downtown.

but there's no doubt that, absolutely, the challenge of detroit is to, you know, have our neighborhoods come back. >> simon: there are neighborhoods here that are doing okay, but in vast parts of this vast city, people say they haven't seen much change, though not everyone has surrendered. john george drove us around the neighborhood where he was born. brightmoor used to house the american dream. auto workers bought homes here, joined the middle class. today, people use parts of it as a dumping ground, literally. it says here, "dumpers will be shot." >> john george: people should not feel safe coming into someone's neighborhood and dumping their trash. >> simon: i don't mean to get hyperbolic, but this street is as bad as any street i've seen in the united states. >> george: well, of course. if all of this would have happened overnight, you'd see fema here, the president, helicopters flying over. but because it took 50 years, there's no urgency. >> it's talking about your mama!

>> simon: which is why john george isn't waiting for the government to save his neighborhood. for 25 years, he has been commanding his own cavalry of volunteers to do the job the city hasn't been able to do-- tear down those houses, remove all that blight. >> george: blight is a very cunning adversary. you... you eliminate it here, and it pops up over there and it kills everything. so you're constantly battling that enemy. >> simon: he's one of many activists doing this. and with help from corporations, including dan gilbert's, he has managed to demolish 300 houses. look at what it takes to tear down just one. rough estimate, how many are left to work on? >> george: only 80,000. >> simon: do you ever feel overwhelmed? >> george: every day. >> simon: but what do you do with all that land once the houses are gone? detroit has become an urban jungle in a unique way.

paul weertz used to be a public school teacher. now, he's a farmer, right in the middle of the city, cultivating acre after acre of abandoned lots. there used to be ten houses here; now, there's kale. >> paul weertz: eggplant, tomatoes, lots of vegetables. potatoes and garlic you can't see, they're underground. >> simon: and not just for family consumption. this movement, urban farming, is growing as a commercial venture. everything is for sale. if detroit is, in fact, moving slowly uphill, do you think what you're doing, this movement, is part of it? >> weertz: yes, yes, i think it's going to be the citizens that change it, a little at a time. and i think we're doing that. >> simon: but a little at a time just won't cut it when you've got a debt of $18.5 billion. earlier this year, the governor of michigan declared a financial emergency and appointed bankruptcy attorney kevyn orr to

take over detroit. he's been given 18 months to figure out how to repair the damage caused by more than 50 years of plummeting tax revenues, spending sprees, borrowing binges, and corruption. orr is looking for ways to free up more than a billion dollars to restore basic services that have been missing for so long. >> kevyn orr: we're getting at some of the issues already. we have a new lighting authority stood up. the new police chief is getting at some much needed reform over at the police department. >> simon: a better fire department? >> orr: all those issues in public safety-- police, fire, e.m.s. when i leave, i think those issues are going to be in place. >> simon: okay, now, these things are, for you, more important than the numbers. >> orr: no. they're all equally important, because if i don't get the balance sheet issues resolved, i can't do anything else. >> simon: but balancing the books will include cutting health care and pension costs, which make up much of detroit's debt. if orr's declaration of bankruptcy is approved by a federal judge, it will allow

detroit to pay only a fraction of what it owes to bondholders who lent it billions, and to city employees and retirees counting on their pensions. what do you tell a pensioner who's making $20,000 a year that he might make less? >> orr: "i'm sorry. this is unfortunate. i recognize how severe it is." you know, i come from pretty common stock. i, by no means, am insensitive to the human cost, but we don't have a choice. these choices have been made for us a long time ago. >> simon: the dispute over who gets hit and how hard has moved into the unlikeliest of places, the detroit institute of arts. the museum's director, graham beal, showed us around. >> graham beal: the whole collection is owned by the city. >> simon: when kevyn orr hired christie's auction house to appraise the collection, it created a frenzy about whether he might sell some of detroit's treasures to help pay the bills. what would the matisse go for?

>> beal: i really don't know. $70 million, $80 million, something like that. i leave that to the experts. >> simon: but what do you sacrifice first, a pension or a painting? don't you think it would be a very nice symbolic sign to people in the neighborhoods if you sold off a few very valuable paintings? >> orr: i'm really not interested so much in symbolism. i'm interested in what makes sense, both now and in the legacy. you know, new york didn't have to turn central park into condos. a number of different cities, when they went through this process, you don't have to sell off your, you know, grandmother's china and your wedding silver. >> simon: what detroit needs is cash. the city has started fighting blight with some of the nearly $300 million in federal funds that orr has helped secure. for detroit, that's just a jump start. the country will be watching the motor city to see if it can begin moving forward after 50 years of going in reverse.

>> cbs money watch update sponsored by: >> good evening. early estimates show social security benefits for 58 million americans will rise just 1.5% next year. the imf said this weekend the u.s. needs to take urgent action to raise the debt ceiling before thursday's deadline. and it's columbus day tomorrow, but markets will be open. i'm jeff glor, cbs news. if you're looking for help relieving heartburn,

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>> safer: pancreatic cancer is one of the most aggressive and deadly cancers, in part because often, by the time it is diagnosed, the disease has spread to other parts of the body. so when news broke last year that a test had been developed

that might detect early pancreatic cancer, the research world not only took notice, it went into shock, for the test hadn't been developed by some renowned cancer research institute, but by a boy wonder, a 15-year-old high school freshman named jack andraka. he then convinced an eminent cancer researcher to let him use his lab to develop his theory, all before he even had a license to drive. and while the test must undergo years of clinical trials, the biotech industry has already beaten a path to jack's door. ( cheering ) this is jack andraka as he beats out 1,500 contestants and wins the grand prize at the intel international science fair with his invention. like a modern day rocky, this self-described science geek took the stage and $100,000 in prize money. pure, unadulterated adolescent

joy. when you won the intel award, your reaction went viral on the internet, correct? >> jack andraka: yes, yes, it did. ( laughs ) >> safer: it's a no-joke award. >> jack andraka: i wasn't expecting any awards there. then, when i won, i was just flabbergasted. i was, like, freaking out. i was just like, "what?" >> safer: yes, you were. >> jack andraka: "me?" >> safer: jack andraka's journey from suburban baltimore high school freshman to cancer researcher began at age 14 when a family friend died of pancreatic cancer. shocked that there is no reliable early test for the disease, jack decided he would develop one. he began probing the internet for everything he could find about pancreatic cancer biomarkers. he read research articles during class, and in the middle of biology, while stealthily reading a medical journal, he says inspiration hit. the teacher was not amused.

>> jack andraka: i swear, she has, like, eyes on the back of her head or something. she sees me, and she storms up to my desk and is like, "mr. andraka, what is this?" and, like, snatches it out of my hand. >> safer: as if you had "playboy" magazine right? >> jack andraka: yeah, yeah. i'm just like... "it was just a science article. shouldn't this be a good thing?" >> safer: when he told his parents, steve and jane andraka, about his project, they weren't exactly encouraging. >> steve andraka: my reaction wasn't a good one. i said, "jack, isn't that a little far-fetched?" >> jane andraka: and i know that when you're 14, you can't just run out and get a lab. a lot of people, you know, are like, "we don't train middle schoolers." >> safer: but jack decided to find one that did. over the course of four months, he prepared a test protocol for his theory and sent it out to 200 cancer researchers. >> jack andraka: i essentially had to send them my budget, my procedure, my timeline and materials list. and i actually got 199 rejections out of those. some professors ripped apart my procedure completely.

but one professor, dr. anirban maitra, finally said yes. >> safer: an encouraging yes? >> jack andraka: it was like, "this idea might work." and he starts interrogating me, kind of firing these questions, trying to sink my procedure, in a way. but i answered all of them. >> safer: dr. anirban maitra was a professor of oncology at johns hopkins university, and now heads pancreatic cancer research at m.d. anderson cancer center in houston. he says his curiosity was piqued by jack's proposal. >> dr. anirban maitra: well, it's not every day that you get an e-mail from a 15-year-old that comes with a detailed protocol, with methods and supplies and what pitfalls you might run into. and i said, "maybe i'll get you a corner in my lab and we'll have one of the post-doctoral fellows supervising you. let's see where all this... this all goes." ( laughs ) >> safer: for the next seven months, after school and on weekends, jack's mother would

drop him off at the lab where he learned basic lab techniques and worked on developing his cancer test. >> jack andraka: finally, one day in march, i realized this was actually working. like, it was working amazingly. because it was passing all of these preliminary tests. and i run out and, pretty much, like, screaming around the lab. i finally go out and rush into my mom's car. and, like, me and her are screaming in the car. and then, of course, i have school the next day. >> safer: jack's test detects an unusually high level of mesothelin, a protein that the body produces in pancreatic cancer's early-- and most treatable-- stage. what exactly are you doing now? >> andraka: so essentially what this is is it's one of my strips, and what you do is you first get an original measurement of how the electricity flows across it. >> safer: the paper strip is coated with a carbon substance that attracts mesothelin. it is placed in an apparatus that jack built in his parents' garage.

>> jack andraka: and i'm just taking out one single drop of blood here. >> safer: a high level of mesothelin in a patient's blood sample may indicate the first stages of pancreatic cancer. >> jack andraka: see how it's increased? it's increased by about two times here. and so what that means is that there's a really high level of this one protein there, and that signals the presence of pancreatic cancer for me. >> safer: while years of clinical trials must be done-- there is no f.d.a.-approved test that can reliably measure mesothelin-- dr. maitra says a test of this kind that could detect pancreatic cancer in its earliest stage could save thousands of lives. >> maitra: he did hone into the most important missing aspect in terms of pancreatic cancer, which is we don't really have good early detection. there is nothing like a psa test or a colonoscopy or a mammogram that you can get for the pancreas at this point in time. so by the time the majority of patients present, they already

have tumor that has spread outside the pancreas, and those patients typically don't do very well. >> safer: he says the test, which costs jack three cents a strip to make, is remarkably elegant in its simplicity. it's remarkable what you've achieved and what you've come up with. it's no question. have the brain men come to talk to you and want to figure you out? >> jack andraka: no, actually, no one has approached me to do, like, an autopsy of my brain yet, but... >> safer: a scan, shall we say. >> jack andraka: a scan. but, like, maybe later on, an autopsy. but, really, i don't think it's that i'm really smart. i... i mean, i know people that are way smarter than me. you can be a genius, but if you don't have the creativity to put that knowledge to use, then you just have a bunch of knowledge and nothing else. i mean, like, then you're just as good as my smart phone. >> safer: his parents say he has been obsessed with science since he was a toddler, conducting

experiments even as a three year old. school, for him, was so easy, his parents tried to keep him engaged by encouraging science projects at home. >> jack andraka: my family isn't the typical family. like, we're... instead of, like, talking about football, we have, like, all these science magazines all scattered throughout our house. and we talk about them at dinner. >> safer: after jack decided to cultivate e. coli just for the fun of it on the kitchen stove, his parents insisted that he and his older brother luke use the basement as their lab. their parents believe the less they know about what goes on down there, the better. i gather the rule of the house is, don't burn down the house and don't kill yourself? >> steve andraka: pretty much. it's "don't blow up the house. i want to come home and have a place to live." >> safer: what do they do down there? >> jane andraka: i don't really know because i don't go down there much. >> safer: and they may have reason for concern. clearly, neatness does not count. ( laughs ) last year, luke cooked up some nitroglycerin, just to see if he

could. >> luke andraka: and i was just interested to see, could i make it down here? it worked. >> safer: it also drew the attention of the fbi, who, they say, sent a letter letting them know that their internet purchasing history had been noted by the feds. >> luke andraka: they were a little concerned >> safer: ( laughs ) i don't know why i'm laughing. but these days, jack doesn't have much time for messing in the basement. >> jack andraka. ( applause ) >> safer: his test idea has made him a star speaker at medical conferences all over the world. >> jack andraka: so, with me, i just used google and wikipedia to find a new way to attack pancreatic cancer. at the beginning of this, i didn't even know i had a pancreas. so if i could do that... ( laughter ) >> safer: and he's become a regular at the white house-- four visits this year alone. >> president barack obama: where's jack? there he is. jack, stand up. ( applause ) >> safer: you've also become a heavy-duty celebrity? >> jack andraka: it's pretty insane. i mean, you see barack obama. >> safer: president barack obama. >> jack andraka: yeah, president barack obama. ( laughs )

and i'm just like, "hello, mr. president." and then, "hello, first lady." it's just... like, it's crazy. >> safer: in the past year, he has spoken in canada, italy, australia, greece, the united nations and, so far, four trips to england... >> jack andraka: earlier this year... >> safer: ...including this address he gave to the renowned royal society of medicine about his test and the problems with current cancer diagnostics. >> jack andraka: i type this into the internet... >> safer: this 15-year-old has all the confidence of a physician... >> jack andraka: and what it comes up with is i could be going through cocaine withdrawal, i could have cancer, or i could be pregnant, so... >> safer: ...a stand-up physician... >> jack andraka: so, what i see in the future of medical diagnostics is a shift from the symptom base to more of a diagnostic antibodies based approach, such as a sensor. >> safer: ...working the crowds of academics and checking out cambridge university. no big deal. >> jane andraka: could you study here?

>> jack andraka: yes. >> safer: jack easily maintains a 4.0 g.p.a. in school, despite a spotty attendance record. you're still in high school, correct? >> jack andraka: yeah. >> safer: why bother? >> jack andraka: ( laughs ) well, the reason i still bother with high school is because of my mom. she... she's really, like, "you have to do high school and you have to go to college," but... they're being kind of lenient with me right now. >> jane andraka: who wants tea? >> safer: jack's family is pretty laid back about his success-- low pressure and a high sense of humor. they say that all work and no play makes jack a dull boy. and it seems that you've been doing all work. >> jack andraka: well, i would say, "all play, no work," because, for me, going to the lab is pretty much play, i mean, it's the funnest thing ever. >> safer: jack holds the patent on his cancer test, and with the help of his patent lawyer, is looking to license the technology to a pharmaceutical company in the next few months. now, the actual testing, on people or animals, i gather you're not interested in doing that?

>> jack andraka: so, i did some preliminary studies. however, one thing i don't want to do is end up as a lab rat. i kind of want to be able to come up with a new idea, and then really just move on to the next idea, and have other people do the repetitive trials. >> safer: well, where does that stand right now? >> jack andraka: i have enough data to prove that this works, and so now i'm going to give it to the pharmaceutical companies to run it through, like, clinical trials and stuff. >> safer: he believes that, one day, his invention will be in every doctor's office and even on pharmacy shelves. but dr. maitra, who has seen so many promising ideas flame out when it comes to pancreatic cancer, urges caution. >> maitra: pancreatic cancer is a very humbling disease. every time we think we have a home run, we barely get to first base. as a test, it is still a very long way off, and the reason for that is because such a test cannot be marketed unless it has been validated in large clinical trials.

and that cannot be done in a small lab. that cannot be done by a 15- year-old, but that does not detract in any way from the remarkable achievement of this young man. i think he is brilliant. >> jack andraka: i was sitting in class and suddenly it hit me... >> safer: between speaking engagements and the occasional appearance at school, jack is back in the lab working on new diagnostic and environmental tests. >> congratulations. >> safer: and while he now moves in very adult circles, jack says when it comes to his future, he is just like any other lost teenager. >> jack andraka: i actually have no clue what i want to do when i grow up. i mean, hopefully, something in science i'll be in. and hopefully, i'll be doing work that will help change the world. >> safer: jack has come up with a new diagnostic invention, and is using it to compete for the $10 million tricorder x prize in medical diagnostics. all of the 300 plus teams competing are made up of adult researchers, except for one.

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>> stahl: you've heard of the brave and ingenious rescue of jews from the nazis by oscar schindler, and the courageous and unlikely rescue of the american hostages from iran depicted in the movie "argo." but nobody's heard of the daring and dangerous rescue of the vietnamese from saigon by john riordon. it's a story that's never been told before. it happened nearly 40 years ago, at the very end of the vietnam war, when everyone was trying to escape the communist incursion. no one was paying attention to an unassuming american banker who had already been evacuated, going back in to save his stranded vietnamese colleagues and their families.

you got everybody... >> john riordon: everybody. >> stahl: ...everybody who worked at the bank, spouses and children? >> riordon: right. >> stahl: there were 105 in all who john riordan, risking his own life, rescued in the last days of the war. even now, four decades later, when they see him, you know they know he's the reason they're alive. today, they're leading prosperous lives as american citizens, with children who are doctors and lawyers, and with grandchildren. >> riordon: isabel, do you know my name? >> isabel: john riordan. >> riordon: you even know my last name! it's even more than i know. >> stahl: john riordan was as far from rambo and "mission: impossible" as you could get. back in 1975, he was a young banker, handsome and unattached, working as the assistant manager of citibank in saigon. they gave you a villa. >> riordon: they gave me a villa. >> stahl: and you lived well. >> riordon: i lived well, yes. >> stahl: he hosted barbecues at the villa for the bank's 34 vietnamese employees-- tellers,

secretaries, accountants. they were like a family, tying their future to american banking. but that april, communist tanks were barreling toward saigon. hundreds of thousands were leaving, or trying to. three weeks before saigon fell, john got an order from citibank in new york-- burn everything important and get out. >> riordon: they said, "john, we've chartered a 747 pan am that's coming in. and we want you to take all of your staff and leave the bank and get out to this plane." >> stahl: by this point, it dawns on you what would happen to those people if you didn't get them out. >> riordon: some of them would be killed. >> cuc pham-vo: it's scary. it was very scary. cuc pham-vo worked in personnel; chi vu was the head teller. they were hearing rumors of reprisals by the vietcong against anyone working for the americans.

would you have been seen as traitors, as spies? >> cuc: the closer you to american, the more they think you spy. >> stahl: but their own government set up checkpoints to keep people from leaving the country. without exit papers, the staff had no way to escape. john didn't want to leave without them. but the bank ordered him out. so he boarded that pan am flight to hong kong alone. and the employees were left to fend for themselves. did you feel abandoned? >> cuc: yes. >> stahl: did john say anything to you when he left? >> chi vu: i was crying so much. i was worried about my kids, my husband. and he said, "don't worry. i'll be there for you." >> stahl: john and his bosses at citibank spent day and night in hong kong cooking up rescue plans. they tried to send in helicopters, even an oil tanker. and they asked the u.s. government to help, all in vain.

>> riordon: i felt we had all those people back in there, and they were counting on us. and many, many times, in the conversations we had with them, they said to us, "don't let us down. please do everything you can." >> stahl: but after two weeks of trying, citibank said "enough." a manager told the hong kong team, "if you try some daring rescue mission, you're fired!" that night, john's immediate boss, mike mctighe, a former marine, asked john to dinner. >> riordon: and just as my steak arrived and i was picking up my knife and fork and he's making small talk, and then he suddenly... he says, "you know, john, one of us has to go back." and i put down my... >> stahl: oh! >> riordon: ...knife and fork and pushed that steak back, and i can feel tears coming out of my eyes. and he said, "would you go back?" >> stahl: go back even though it meant losing his job, possibly losing his life. and yet, 11 days before saigon

would fall, the mild-mannered banker defied his bank and better judgment, caught the very last commercial flight into saigon, and walked into the branch. >> riordon: and everybody comes running around me and said, "what do we do? what do we do? how are we going to get out of here?" and everything. >> stahl: but you're there under the authority of who? you're not working for citibank. >> riordon: no one. no one. on my own. >> stahl: on his own authority, john moved them, with their families-- all 105 of them-- into his villa and another one nearby so they'd all be ready to go as a group when and if he came up with a plan. he told them to tell no one where they were. four days went by. nothing was working, until a cia agent told him-- the only way out now is on u.s. military cargo planes that are evacuating americans and their dependents. >> riordon: he says, "the evacuation has been begun. take your family and go out to the airport and process them through."

and i said, "well, i don't have a family." and he said, "just create a wife and children, no matter who they are, and go out there and sign the documents." >> stahl: this is the first time you've heard this idea? >> riordon: yes, yes. >> stahl: try and pass off his vietnamese colleagues, their spouses and children as his family? there were 105 of them! do you say to him, "are you kidding me?" you don't say cockamamie? you don't say-- >> riordon: no, no. because there'd been so much cockamania before that, this was a time to jump on anything that looked like it was going to float. >> stahl: you were at the end of your rope. >> riordon: yes, absolutely. >> stahl: it was worth a try, but not for all of them at once. he took the bank van and went out to the airfield alone to see if it would work. >> riordon: i walked into that processing area and i... somebody gave me a piece of paper. he said, "list your dependents on here." and i was fumbling for what piece of paper i was going to have to write this all down.

they said, "just attach that to this piece of paper and keep going." >> stahl: there were 15 names... >> riordon: it was a bit of a rush. >> stahl: you had a wife and 14 names. >> riordon: right. that was kind of ambitious. >> stahl: daughter, son, daughter... >> riordon: right. >> stahl: ...son. yeah. this is the paper-- wife, daughter, daughter, son. 14 kids, some older than he was. he was certifying on a u.s. government document that these were his children. is your heart pounding? >> riordon: yes, a little bit. >> stahl: palms sweating? >> riordon: i certainly was nervous, yes. >> stahl: he was stunned when the officer-- no questions asked-- stamped it and handed john evacuation tags. he rushed to the villa to pick the 15 up, amazed that such a crazy idea was actually working. do you remember when he came back what happened? >> cuc: we so happy and elation to see. he is a life saver. he an angel. >> stahl: but you had to keep it secret, right? >> chi: yes. >> stahl: you never told your parents? >> cuc: no. >> stahl: so you never said goodbye? >> cuc: no.

>> stahl: over the next four days, as fear gripped the city, john repeated this ruse, going back and forth to the airport ten times, filling out papers with groups of six or eight. did any of these officers ever question you in all this time? >> riordon: this one man, he said, "haven't i seen you here before?" i said, "no, sir, absolutely not." bang. i know he wanted to get going, too. and then, another time, this man said, "well, you've got one heck of a big family here, huh? you've been busy when you've been..." i said, "oh yes, i've been here a long time." and just stamped it again. >> stahl: you just went back and back and back. >> riordon: hard to believe it would be that simple to do. >> stahl: we recently met with seven of his "daughters". they didn't think it was all that simple since john was separating them from their husbands. >> all the staff women will go first, and the husbands will leave in a separate group. at that moment i was thinking,

"will i ever see my husband again?" >> stahl: getting the husbands out was the most dangerous. >> yes, because they were either in the army or working for the government. and if the m.p. they saw anybody like that or they caught anybody like that, they would shoot right away. >> stahl: john was able to get the husbands fake adoption papers as his sons. and managed to get some of them on what he thought was safe, a u.s. embassy evacuation bus like this one to the airport. but the bus was stopped by police looking for deserters. >> riordon: the driver of the bus stopped at the checkpoint, opened the door, and a vietnamese police officer stepped onto the bus. and he looked up and down the aisle and i thought, "this is it. we are all going to be taken off this bus and shot." but in a split second, a woman

sitting in the front seat, a vietnamese woman, leaped up toward the policeman and poked her hands into his stomach. i thought she knifed him. and then i saw a bag of something move from her hands to his hands and i thought "aha, it's a bribe!" >> stahl: bag of money? >> riordon: bag of money, yes. >> stahl: the bribe worked; he waved them through. the last group of men at the villa were afraid to risk another bus, but john was out of ideas. finally, one of the men thought up an ingenious plan-- they pretended they were delivering bundles of money to the airport in the bank van. they even called the police for an escort like this. >> riordon: and they had rifles and everything. and they just led us right through the gates of the airport. >> stahl: you just went right on the plane with these guys? >> riordon: right. they were safe. >> stahl: all of them? >> riordon: all of them. >> stahl: one of them was chi's husband. >> stahl: every time i ask you about john, you cry. >> chi: he's so kind, you know,

to stay behind and take... took us out. he did so much for us. saved my kids and my husband. >> stahl: they flew on one of the last planes out of saigon. after that, the only route of escape were the helicopters at the u.s. embassy. within a few days, vietcong tanks rolled into the presidential palace. the war was over. what followed were years of starvation and brutal repression. many who tried to escape by boat drowned at sea. but thanks to john, the citibank employees were flown out to either guam or the philippines, and then all reunited at camp pendleton in california. do you think all this time you've been fired? >> riordon: yeah, i do still think that. i'm not worried about it,

though. i'm still alive, they're all alive. important things. >> stahl: well, he wasn't fired. he was given a big bonus and hailed as a hero. at the reunion for john in long island with a group of his "children," we found out they call him "papa." >> papa john... >> riordon: do you remember me? >> yes, i do. i haven't talked to you in a long time >> stahl: citibank spent a million dollars to resettle all the employees, giving them and many of the spouses jobs. >> riordon: i will never forget you, too. >> stahl: at the time, in saigon, he thought of his colleagues at the bank as his vietnamese family. 40 years later-- still his family, but now, as american as... >> cheese! >> stahl: do you think the people who came here have had good lives? >> riordon: yes, i do. >> stahl: how many children do you actually have now, and grandchildren? >> riordon: i just keep using the number 105. but the grandchildren, don't ask me.

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>> stahl: in the mail, comments on steve kroft's story about waste and fraud in the social security disability system. many viewers thought it was long overdue. "i have worked for a law firm that does disability work for 12 years. the abuse of the system that i have seen is terrible." but other viewers called the story unfair to the legitimately disabled." i have yet to see a more biased, republican-pandering news report. you sure failed on this one." "disability benefits are hard to obtain. two-thirds of the applications are rejected." we were surprised at how many people offered to turn in their disability-collecting neighbors and relatives. one viewer accused "a woman down the street" of secretly cleaning houses. another viewer pointed the finger at a not-so-disabled stepson, and one man complained

about his malingering mother-in- law. i'm lesley stahl. we'll be back next week with another edition of "60 minutes." captioning funded by cbs and ford captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org you really love, what would you do?" ♪ [ woman ] i'd be a writer. [ man ] i'd be a baker. [ woman ] i wanna be a pie maker. [ man ] i wanna be a pilot. [ woman ] i'd be an architect. what if i told you someone could pay you and what if that person were you? ♪

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phil: previously on "the amazing race" -- 10 teams continued racing through chile. on the with us to santiago, tim and marie formed a bond with the baseball wives. >> i have no problem giving you the express pass. >> we can trust them -- phil: at a shoeshine road block, some teams crashed, while nicky's hopes were dashed. a mistake in the homestretch by the afghanimals. you need to settle your cab bill before i can check you in. gave former nfl players chester d ephraim a victory, while rowan and shane took their final curtain call. nine teams remain. who will be