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Charlie Palumbo had been waiting to get his hands on that 1978 green and white Volkswagen bus.

Palumbo, a Honolulu architect, bought it from a friend who bought it from a used car lot. The bus became part of an in-store design Palumbo created for a Kailua surf shop. Palumbo told the store owner he would buy the van back from her in a couple of years, and this year, he did.

Guys who love old cars love knowing the provenance of the vehicle as much as the specs. A clue to the van's back story was hidden under a back seat, revealed during prep work for reupholstering.

There, among dust, rust and candy wrappers, was a wallet. There wasn't much inside, no money, just some pictures of a girl, some military ID papers and a Nevada driver's license with a profile picture of a blue-eyed man too young to have the full-face photo. His name was Michael Reid.

Palumbo immediately began searching online for Reid. What he found was a family Web site set up by Mike's father, Noble Reid, a retired Teamster who lives in Elgin, Ore.

Palumbo sent Noble an e-mail: "Aloha from Hawaii," it started. "You are not going to believe this."

A week later, the wallet was back in Mike Reid's hands and the story was starting to unfold.

"Got it and thank you," Mike replied in an e-mail written by his father. "It brought a tear to my eye when I opened it, all the memories came flooding back, stuff I haven't thought about for years. I wonder if you have looked into the Marine who fell off the Pali Nov. 28, 1978. It might make for some interesting reading. Anyway thank you for my wallet it puts things into a clearer perspective."

On what Noble Reid calls "that sad day" in 1978, Mike, then a 23-year-old Marine corporal, went hiking with a friend on the Pali. They were caught in an afternoon rainstorm, and Mike lost his grip and fell 75 feet onto rocks. He suffered head and leg injuries and had to be airlifted out. He was taken to what was then known as Queen's Hospital in a coma.

Noble remembers, "We were notified by the Marine Corps that he may not live through the night, and were flown over by the service to be with him."

Mike made it through the night and came out of the coma after eight days. He was treated at Tripler Army Medical Center and later was transferred to the San Diego Naval Hospital, where he worked on recovering.

"Mike is doing OK," his dad says. "He is 100 percent disabled. But, it is not as bad as it seems. He suffered many years with seizures from the head trauma, and went through depression from being discharged from the Marine Corps. The Corps was his life, and he thought that there was something he could do even though he was disabled."

Mike Reid is 52 years old now, and able to manage his daily needs on his own. He has a grown daughter and lives near his father in Oregon.

"We meet each Sunday morning for a family breakfast, and get hugs and back slaps galore," says Noble, 73.

"His VA hospital is just over the mountain at Walla Walla, Wash., so he can make the trip easy as pie if he needs anything from them. So all in all we are blessed that he is here with us, and is happy."

And he was very happy to get his wallet back, even though it was such a strong reminder of that sad day. He left the wallet hidden under the seat of the VW bus they drove to the Pali that day in 1978.

Noble said, "He put the wallet up to his heart and closed his eyes for just a moment to go back in time for an instant. He sorta lived being a young Marine again."

Palumbo, himself a Marine veteran, sent this message to Noble: "Tell Mike us Marines stick together and I'm glad the wallet made it back home."

Lee Cataluna's column runs Tuesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Reach her at 535-8172 or lcataluna@honoluluadvertiser.com.