Cleanup honors singer
John Denver inspires push against litter By MARK FREEMAN ASHLAND -- Like hundreds of others from Washington to Georgia, Diane Novak finds that honoring dead singer John Denver is best done wearing bright reflective clothing and picking up discarded bottles of urine. Or fast-food wrappers, dirty clothes and god-knows-what-else motorists pitch from their cars along a 2-mile stretch of Interstate 5 near Ashland. "If we brought home all the car parts, we could probably build ourselves a car -- and we've found the screwdrivers and other tools to build it," laughs Novak, a 33-year-old substitute teacher. But to the Friends of John Denver, keeping a stretch of highway free of debris is perhaps the best way to honor the singer-conservationist, who died in October 1997 in the crash of an experimental airplane off the California coast. Novak runs the Oregon Friends of John Denver. There are such groups in 38 states and three foreign countries that regularly clean litter from highway shoulders -- just like Denver repeatedly told them to do in song at environmental conferences and conservation programs he supported. "Litter just drove him crazy," says Carole Kenney, a Colorado horse-farm owner who heads a Friends of John Denver Web site that highlights all the stretches of cleaned highways adopted in Denver's name. "He used to tell us, if we didn't put litter on the ground we still needed to pick it up," Kenney says. Now, Friends of John Denver chapters are picking up trash as far away as England, Germany and Japan. In each instance, chapters contact their state transportation departments to adopt a stretch of highway for regular cleaning. In return, the states usually supply the reflective clothing and garbage bags for the actual cleanup parties and install highway signs touting the chapters' work. They all keep tabs on each other through the Internet, posting pictures of their respective Adopt a Highway signs. The groups are not all "Rocky Mountain High" and don't play Denver's "Annie's Song" -- a wedding staple -- repeatedly, nor rent "Oh God!" every Saturday night. "I like his music, but I don't listen to it every day," Kenney says. "I don't have the CDs blaring in my car." But they feel spurred to do something environmentally conscious because of him. "John always let us know through his music and actions that he really cared about the planet," says Novak. "Before, I taught it in my class, didn't litter and recycled. But (Denver) inspired me to become active." Novak, who grew up listening to Denver tunes, was always a fan and watched the singer's last Britt Festival concert just weeks before his fatal crash. Already a don't-litter buff from childhood, Novak chose to adopt the stretch of I-5 from the north Ashland and Talent exits for litter patrol in Denver's name. As more Denver fans in California, Washington, Texas, Colorado, Georgia and other states started doing the same, they all came under the Friends of John Denver umbrella. "We usually have little competitions on who finds the grossest stuff," says Kenney, in Colorado. "Bottles full of pee that I find are the grossest." Novak has conducted a half-dozen cleanups in the past two years, with the next one expected later this month. Previous ones have drawn more than a dozen helpers, some of whom travel from as far away as Roseburg and Chico, Calif., to grab and bag trash with fellow J.D.'ers. "`J.D. people are different," says Robert Novak, Diane Novak's playground-designing husband and Jimmy Buffet fan. "I don't understand it at all. "I'm just the supportive husband, doing all the cleanups with her," he says. |
