Country Lines readers, in­cluding me, are amazed and grateful for all the volunteer work by senior citizens that make the world a better place.

So, I want to nominate John Devres, 75, better known as “the can man of Paradise,” as the Country Lines volunteer of the year.

Over the past four years, John has contributed more than $10,000 to the athletic department of a small, struggling school with only 55 students, kindergarten through 12 grade.

John has collected more than 100,000 beer and pop cans and donated all the return money to the school. The school kids call him “the Paradise angel.”

Pat Rowley, himself a Paradise hero, is school principal, superintendent, basketball coach and substitute bus driver. He can’t say enough about Dreves.

“He retired as a Traverse City postal clerk and moved to Paradise in 1979. He was a Traverse City Central High School basketball star and he volunteered to help us coach our little Paradise team. The kids loved him but he had to undergo open heart surgery. The surgery went well but he got an infection and spent 58 days in a Traverse City hospital, 18 of those days in a coma,” Rowley said.

John said his recovery was largely due to the support back in Paradise, where the kids and school staff made trips to Traverse City to see him.

John’s wife, Zelna, said he kneeled and kissed the hospital door the day he was discharged and made a new dedication to the Paradise kids.

“I decided four years ago that I would collect cans until I had 75,000 by my 75th birthday and thus make $7,500 for the athletic teams. By my 75th birthday, I already had 90,000 cans,” John said.

He has collecting barrels in about six locations, including his own driveway. “I urge cans and bottles from everyone,” he said, “and I tell folks what they drink is strictly between them and me and the supermarket collecting machine.”

Paradise school kids have no football, only volleyball, soccer and basketball. When the winter shuts down the boat ferries to their rivals at Mackinac and Beaver islands, the teams have to fly in small planes that hold only six kids and cost $500 per trip. John’s can money means that more kids can go.

Rowley says he can’t find words to describe the importance of John’s cans.

“Our little rag-tag group had to buy their own shorts, shirts and shoes until one special day when John’s money bought uniforms. Pride of new uniforms brought athletic performance to a new high. As the basketball coach, I witnessed it all, thanks to our Paradise angel,” Rowley said.

John spends hours in his garage, which he calls “sorting central” because each can and bottle must be put in special bins for certain stores that will accept certain brands.

“When I drive to Sault Ste. Marie or Newberry, I sometimes push hundreds of cans and bottles into machines at several stores. Stores without machines are good to me. I count the cans and they trust me and give me the money for the returns,” John said.

But before all that sorting starts at John’s home, he wiggles the pull tab off each can. “I collect the pull tabs for my daughter in Munising. She and the American legion Post trade them in at $1 per pound to buy medical equipment for children.

When John’s can project was featured in the Detroit Free Press in a column by Susan Agar, many readers responded. Dave and Judith Danley of Cincinnati, OH, visited John and gave him $150. Two Farmington Hills boys, Evan, 12 and Avery 10, cashed in their garage cans and sent $6.50 to the Paradise school. Ron and Marilyn Rolph of Holland sent $200 to the school and mailed a separate check for $50 to John to buy gas for his Suburban. A Detroit man sent him a bumper sticker: “This Suburban brakes for cans.”

John and his cans have brought fame to the little town of Paradise. Newspaper and TV crews have come to do features. On my last trip to John’s home with my cans, I could not get into his driveway because it was filled with a four-man camera and reporter crew from ESPN Sports. They were in town for two days to do a story on John for the sports center shows on Sunday. As Darl and I strode up there with our sacks of cans, ESPN workers began filming and interviewing us. What fun, and a much-deserved honor for John. Thanks ESPN, for recognizing a nice man in a nice little town.

They also did a good job on John’s heart at Traverse City hospital. No heart in the Upper Peninsula beats with more caring for others.