A memorable line from the animated series King of the Hill draws directly from a 1992 farming incident in North Dakota. In the Season 4 premiere, Peggy Hill mentions a farm worker who dialed 911 using his nose after losing both arms. The reference honors the real experience of John Thompson, who survived the ordeal.
The episode, titled Peggy Hill: The Decline and Fall and first aired in 1999, shows Peggy in a body cast after a skydiving accident. She motivates herself by recalling the farm boy's actions during his recovery. Thompson was 18 years old when his shirt caught in farm equipment without an active safety mechanism, severing his arms completely. Alone on the family farm, he used his nose and a pencil held in his mouth to call for help, then waited in a bathtub to avoid staining the carpet with blood. His limbs were later reattached at a hospital in Minnesota.
