I remember when a local doctor ran out of fuel (at night) just a few miles from the airport in his C172. He was directly over a lightly travelled highway but his instructor had told him to never land on a road. So, he aimed for an empty field adjacent to the highway. He ended up landing in a corn field that was planted in the middle of an abandoned gravel quarry. Lucky for him, he came to a grinding halt some 30 feet short of a wall of gravel and rock that was 40 feet high at the end of the field. The wings had to be removed to get it out of the field because it was too short to fly it out. Afterwards, he said he shouldn't have listened to his instructor, who just happened to be the same guy who had taught him to never trust his fuel guages and to always check his tanks with a dip stick, something he didn't do that day because "he was in a hurry to get home".
