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Jul 27, 2004

"I went down to the stream behind my house and just cried, wondering how I'd care for my wife and four kids. Then the idea came to me: if you're going to check out, so to speak, try to leave this place better than when you found it." --John Beal

An Open Sewer

Told that he had less than four months to live, the disabled Vietnam Veteran didn't know where to turn. He wandered down to an open sewer -- a stream behind his house that was plugged up with garbage -- to contemplate his future. Still recovering from bullet wounds, suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, three heart attacks, and a serious motorcycle accident, John Beale found the answer: he started cleaning up the stream. "When I yanked out this huge refrigerator, I thought it would surely kill me. Instead I felt better," he said. That was twenty three years ago. Today, John Beal has moved on to save the entire watershed!