Someone should give Sean Patton an award for the work he's done.
But please no trophies.
A century's worth of Lawrence high school trophies are repaired and organized in storage, thanks to the efforts of Sean Patton. The Lawrence High School senior led a group of fellow students and Boy Scouts in the effort, which helped him earn his Eagle Scout rank.
He's probably seen enough of those for a while.
The 18-year-old Lawrence High School senior directed a project in late January to refurbish about 300 trophies and plaques won by the city's high school students in the 20th century.
Patton, who is a member of Boy Scout Troop 59, put together the project as part of his effort to earn the Eagle Scout rank.
He led a team of friends from LHS and about 20 Boy Scouts from his troop in restoring the old awards and constructing a shelved storage area for them.
Most of the trophies and plaques date from the late 1960s to the early 1990s and were earned in football, basketball, volleyball, golf, gymnastics and track and field.
But some of the awards predate LHS, going back to the days of Lawrence Memorial High School and earlier.
One solid-silver cup for scholastic achievement that the students repaired and polished was awarded to Lawrence high school students in 1911.
The oldest awards the group discovered are now arranged in a display case near the school library, with photos detailing Patton's project.
Patton was looking for an activity to do for his Eagle Scout project, and LHS Principal Dick Patterson suggested the idea of fixing up the old trophies.
"I knew I wanted to do something for the school and give back (to LHS) my senior year," says Patton, who was captain of the varsity wrestling team. "I think it paid off. Everyone who has seen this has been impressed."
Decades-old tradition
It took the team of LHS students and Boy Scouts eight hours to clean, repair and organize the awards and build the storage shelves.
The trophies are now stored in a room underneath the school cafeteria. The five tiers of shelves the group built span a recessed space that's 8 feet deep, 12 feet wide and 10 feet high.
"It's one thing to talk about the history and tradition at Lawrence High. It's another thing to see it with your own eyes. And that's what you see when you come down here," Patton says.
"If you look at all these people whose pictures are on these awards, they're the parents of students who are now at LHS. It shows us that previous generations have put in blood, sweat and tears to earn these trophies. This is something that's been going on for decades."
The name of Danny Manning, an LHS graduate and former Kansas University basketball star, appears on several awards from the early 1980s.
One plaque shows that Manning was voted most valuable player in 16 out of 24 games during the 1983-84 basketball season.
Before Patton's project, the old awards had been stored in dusty boxes in a room above the football coaches' office.
"There was about 20 feet of floor that was lined with boxes of trophies. They just have the most recent ones out on display in the school," Patton says. "People were asking about where their trophies were when they came back for reunions. They'd say, 'Where are the trophies we earned?'"
Now it'll be easy for school staff to retrieve awards for display at class reunions and other events.
In July, Patton is headed to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., to attend school. Then he will be required to serve five years of active duty in the U.S. Army.
He was nominated for the prestigious academy by both U.S. Sen. Sam Brownback, R-Kan., and U.S. Rep. Dennis Moore, D-Kan.
In the meantime, Patton's pleased with how his Eagle Scout project at LHS turned out.
"All the feedback I've gotten is really positive. Everyone's impressed with all the tradition and history at Lawrence High," he says.
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