The saddest part about Thursday’s fundraiser for the Travis Van Durme Memorial Scholarship is that he would have loved it.

Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School’s fourth-annual Lift-A-Thon has been moved from the campus weight room to Personal Best Health Club at 22 Market Square in South Paris to accommodate the after-school rush.

It’s easy to imagine Van Durme dropping everything to be part of such a tribute for someone else. Like the now-retired, impossible-to-forget single digit he wore on his Oxford Hills football jersey, Van Durme would have been No. 1 to sign up, No. 1 to get his pledge sheet filled out, and absolutely No. 1 for the most metal hoisted in his division.

“Travis was big into the weight room. Obviously he was a great football player, and a lot of that was because of all the work he did lifting,” said Paul Bickford, head of the guidance department at Oxford Hills.

Bickford coached the Vikings in Van Durme’s senior year, when the tough tailback rushed for the most yards in the Pine Tree Conference.

Van Durme graduated in June 2002. His class reunion came much too early.

Only days before he departed for his freshman year of college in Florida, Van Durme was a passenger in a pickup truck that crashed in Mechanic Falls. The four-year honor student was thrown from the vehicle and pronounced dead at the scene. The driver of the truck, Joshua Mason, later pleaded guilty to manslaughter.

Many classmates put their own travel and school orientation plans on hold in order to attend Van Durme’s funeral in the school gymnasium.

Now finishing up final credits toward their college diplomas or having already entered the job market, friends are still going the extra mile to ensure that the next four-year wave of high school students doesn’t forget their fallen friend.

One former winner of the Lift-A-Thon, Jacob Folz, blocked for Van Durme in his high school career and now plays at the University of Maine.

“A lot of his friends come back because they’re on spring break,” Bickford said. “But it’s not just football players. It’s adults, high school athletes from other sports, boys and girls. Some kids aren’t involved in athletics at all, but just like to work out and want to honor Travis.”

Private donations launched the Travis Van Durme Scholarship Foundation in the months following his death. The Lift-A-Thon is now the primary annual event to replenish those funds. It brings in $2,000 to $3,000 in an average year.

Oxford Hills awards $500 to one boy and one girl in each senior class. The recipients must be four-year athletes who attended OHCHS each of those years. Preference is given to students who plan to major in business.

Participants are asked to solicit pledges. The person raising the most money walks away with a door prize. This year, it’s an iPod. Area businesses supply an array of gift certificates for the top lifter in each division, to be determined in a traditional tournament format.

Travis Van Durme’s light continues to shine in other ways. Since their son’s accident, Doug and Bonnie Van Durme have testified before state lawmakers in support of legislation that would stiffen the punishment for motorists with multiple convictions for driving to endanger.

But no matter how talented an athlete was on the field or in the classroom, there is our human tendency to forget them. Thousands of scholarships have lived a shorter life than their namesakes. Others live on as just another name read at graduation, with few emotional connections to the next generation.

Here are a young man, a family and a community that deserve better. Want to flex your muscles, literally or financially, and help supply the gift of higher education in Travis Van Durme’s name? Contact Bickford or current head football coach Bob Austin at 743-8914.

“For me,” Bickford said, “it’s just about getting people out and doing this to keep Travis’ memory alive.”

Kalle Oakes is a staff writer. His e-mail is [email protected].