LEWISTON – When Gary and Lucille Tetreault began volunteering for Maine Public TV, Lehrer still had MacNeil and Cookie Monster still munched on cookies.

The Tetreaults followed their daughter, then a 12-year-old Rainbow Girl, to a pledge drive.

“And we just kept going,” Lucille said. “We liked the people down there and we liked what they do.”

Their daughter? She’s now 39. And the Auburn couple has been awarded with the title of “Volunteers of the Year” by Maine Public Broadcasting Network.

“I guess we’ve been overdue in honoring them,” said Denis Howard, MPBN’s volunteer coordinator.

The couple is part of a swelling group of more than 1,000 people who give their time to help the station over the course of a year.

Lots of folks deserve honors, Howard said Wednesday.

However, the Tetreaults stood out because of their many years and the way they have so-often served together, he said.

Gary, 62, and Lucille, 60, have spent countless evenings stuffing envelopes or cataloging items for the annual “Great TV Auction.”

For nearly three decades, it’s been something they could do outside their home and help people, side-by-side.

“It’s the kind of people we are,” Gary said of himself and his wife of 42 years. “We go together like ice cream and cake.”

It worked for the TV station in Lewiston.

“People call us,” Gary said. “If we’re available, we go down.”

The couple has become a mainstay of the auction since the early ’80s. They made baskets, took phone bids and ran errands for the on-camera folks. In the days before computers, they’d spend weeks writing details for every item for the hand-drawn descriptions that would be featured on TV.

The volunteer award, which has been given for the past decade, caught both Gary and Lucille by surprise.

“I was shocked,” Lucille said. “There are so many people who give so much time.”

The couple will be awarded plaques in a small ceremony on Sept. 27. The couple is also being featured in MBPN’s monthly magazine, “Experience.”