Every other month the continuing efforts of Scouts like Adam Wells, Lamont Levy, and Mike Melcher create the biggest story in town, Troop 101's 22-year recycling project.
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Every other month the continuing efforts of Scouts like Adam Wells, Lamont Levy, and Mike Melcher create the biggest story in town, Troop 101's 22-year recycling project. |
By Suzanne Wilson
Photo Illustration by John Fulton
In a light rain, a pickup truck moves through downtown Metropolis, Ill., cruising past the red-caped statue of Superman, the town's adopted hero. The truck moves into a residential neighborhood, where the driver pulls to the curb and two Boy Scouts from Troop 101 leap out. They grab a waiting stack of newspapers and quickly load it onto the truck.
Superman--able to bend steel with his bare hands.
Troop 101--able to lift 20 tons of newspaper on a single Saturday morning.
The Scouts don't see themselves as superheroes. But for 22 years the troop has performed a super-type task, turning out one day every other month to collect the town's newspapers for recycling.
The program is both a service project and a money-earning effort. The troop provides a community service, and any Scout who works all six paper drives earns his summer camp fee. Second-year Webelos Scouts from Pack 101 also participate and have their camp fees already paid when they join the troop.
The event starts at a city loading dock near the river. "The most important time is 8:30 in the morning," jokes Scoutmaster Joe Ogle. "That's when the doughnuts arrive,"
For the past 25 years, Ogle and Troop Committee Chairman Ed Koenigsmark have led Troop 101. The troop, with a current membership of 27 Scouts, is chartered to First United Methodist Church and is in the Shawnee Trails Council, headquartered in Owensboro, Ky.
When the two leaders initiated newspaper recycling in 1976, they knew Scouts could handle the rough work. "Both Joe and I remember collecting newspaper during World War II when we were Scouts," Koenigsmark says. He figures Troop 101 has recycled nearly 5.5 million pounds of paper in more than 130 newspaper drives. If that amount had gone into a landfill, it would have occupied about 90,000 cubic feet of space.
Parents and Scouts work together. Committee member Carol Rodgers signs up drivers and hands out neighborhood route maps. Ogle assigns two Scouts to each route crew and other Scouts and parents to unload. While Ogle drives his van on a route, Koenigsmark supervises the dock.
Even before crews start out, trucks come in from collection points across the county. On the way from their farm, Scouts Virgil and Marc Bremer and their dad pick up papers stacked in front of a vacant store in Round Knob. Another truck comes in from the senior citizens' center in Joppa. The Metropolis Planet donates its undelivered papers, too.
Picking up newspapers is only part of the job. At the dock, Scouts and parents transfer the paper to huge cardboard boxes on wooden pallets. Steve Word, forklift operator, moves each full box and pallet up the ramp to a truck trailer. Word volunteers his time, and his employer, Laidlaw Corporation, a manufacturer of coat hangers and dry cleaning supplies, loans the forklift.
Often the newspapers from a single day can fill the troop-owned trailer. The troop contracts with a trucking company to haul the trailer to a manufacturer of padded envelopes in Salem, Ill., 110 miles away.
In 22 years, the troop has postponed only two drives, due to icy roads. They've worked in freezing temperatures and 100-degree July heat.
Today's rain is only an inconvenience for the route crew of Jeremy Beachel, 13, Andy Fellows, 14, and Assistant Scoutmaster Ryan Krempasky. When Krempasky stops the truck, the boys dash out of the cab to grab papers and cover them with a tarp in the pickup bed.
Residents leave bundles of papers on the curb, including the Paducah (Ky.) Sun and, of course, the weekly Planet. At a retirement apartment building, paper fills half the entryway.
Residents are as faithful to this drive as the Scouts. Some watch for the truck and bring paper out when they see it coming; others set out papers under plastic tarps or in trash bags.
"You have to check these bags," Andy warns. "One time I picked up garbage!"
Krempasky spots a car following his truck. Loraine Powell saw the Scouts drive by, jumped in her car, and caught up with them. The assistant Scoutmaster turns the truck around, and the Scouts jump out to collect Powell's newspapers from her garage.
"I didn't think they could use the paper if it was wet," Powell explains, "so when it started raining I moved it back into the garage." She always saves eight weeks' worth of newspapers for the drives. "It helps the Boy Scouts, which is what I want to do."
Everyone knows about the drive, thanks to extensive publicity. Announcements are in the paper and on the radio, and a theater marquee announces in bold letters: Boy Scout Paper Drive Sep 20.
Route crews make two runs, sitting out delays when the rain pours. Back at the dock, workers sort the paper. Slightly damp paper can be loaded; it will dry out when the sun heats up the trailer. Koenigsmark intends to spread out the wettest paper to dry in his garage.
Every other month a new supply of paper is available. The variable is price. The buyer recently paid $27.50 per ton; a few years ago, when demand was temporarily high, paper sold for $110 a ton.
But even when prices are down, the project has paid all or most camp fees.
"Sometimes we subsidize it a little, and sometimes we don't use all of it," Ogle says. "Either way, no one stays home because they can't afford camp."
Another money-earning effort is the troop's food booth at the Fort Massac State Park Encampment, a historical reenactment weekend. The two projects allow the troop to pay most costs of weekend camping and longer trips like whitewater rafting in North Carolina.
Virgil Bremer, 16, has worked most of the paper drives since he was a Webelos Scout. "Instead of running around with your friends," he says, "you sometimes choose this. It's worth it."
Betsy Fellows, Andy's mother, sees paper recycling as "one of the best projects, for a lot of reasons. We know the paper is being reused. And it keeps the Scouts out there, so people know they're doing this service."
In fact, one Metropolis resident who admired the way the Scouts were earning their way to camp left the troop a $10,000 bequest in his will. Invested, the money provides a college scholarship for each Eagle Scout when he graduates from high school.
Over the years, the project has weathered many problems. Before the troop had use of a forklift, they carried paper into a warehouse and later handloaded it onto a buyer's truck. They found buyers and then lost them. Once when they were between buyers, a warehouse roof fell in and rain soaked a year's accumulation of paper.
Along with troop leaders' perseverance and good business decisions, much credit for the project's success goes to parents, Ogle says. "Parents know we're a premier troop, so anytime we ask, they help."
After 25 years, Ogle and Koenigsmark are welcoming the sons of their first Scouts. "We've been at this so long," Koenigsmark says, "we're recycling the next generation."
Suzanne Wilson lives in Joplin, Mo. She wrote "Sharing a Heritage" in the November-December 1997 issue of Scouting.
Some Secrets of a Successful Newsprint Recycling ProjectAfter conducting a newspaper recycling project for more than two decades, the leaders of Troop 101 have gained some vital insights into what makes a successful effort:
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Metropolis: The One and OnlyMetropolis, Ill., is the only municipality in the world incorporated with that name. Its founders envisioned "a mighty city" when they platted the town on the Ohio River in 1839. They never could have imagined that the state legislature would one day officially declare the city to be the home of a mighty superhero. When that happened in 1972, the town launched a tourism campaign built around Superman. The weekly newspaper was renamed The Metropolis Planet, a street became Lois Lane. A 15-foot statue of the Man of Steel (it's actually two tons of bronze) towers next to the Massac County Courthouse. The Man of Steel stands in glorious color (except for the toe of his left boot, left uncolored as an invitation to visitors to touch the spot for good luck). He gazes confidently across Superman Square, as if ready to defend all of downtown. Tourists take pictures and visit the Super Museum with its Superman memorabilia and souvenirs. In June, the Superman Celebration features a street party with music and magic shows, the SuperTrek bike tour, and a mock bank robbery. Superman shows up to save the day, of course. --S.W. |
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