Justin Thran: From birdhouses to Baghdad

With the economic recession and food drives in the news this month, it's hard not to think back to one of the most memorable donors to Northern Nevada food banks, Justin Thran, aka "birdhouse boy."

Justin and his father, Bob Thran of Smith Valley, have been making and selling handcrafted wooden birdhouses and bird feeders and donating all the proceeds to charities including the Carson Valley Community Food Closet and the Food Bank of Northern Nevada.

Justin had been interested in charitable giving since age 5, Bob said, and he officially started in 1994 when he was in fifth grade and won a school contest to have a wish of his granted.

"I made a wish that no one would have to go hungry," Justin, then 14, said in a 1998 story I wrote for The R-C. "It came true, too, because we collected 800 pounds of food and my dad and I delivered it to the food drive in Reno at the Hilton."

Bob was a single father and in an effort to instill a sense of duty and economic understanding in his only son, he taught him that there was a better way to help people than just donating a certain amount of money or food.

"You can take $200 and donate it to a cause, but if you take that same $200, use the money for materials to build 150 bird feeders and sell the feeders, then you have $1,500 to donate instead of the $200," Bob Thran said in that 1998 R-C story.

In 1999, Justin was awarded the prestigious Jefferson Award, given for outstanding service to one's community. That year, he donated $7,000 to the food agencies, bringing his lifetime total to $19,000.

"I think this must be like getting the Oscar," Justin, then 15, said in a Feb. 13, 1999 article I wrote for the R-C. "It makes me feel good, but I don't do it for the attention."

By 2002, Justin and his father had donated more than $100,000 to those agencies, much of it through the Drive-by Food Drive in Reno, which will be in its 16th year this Friday, Dec. 12. Justin participated in eight food drives, often being featured on television as he made his donation.

"I'm almost 20 now and it's getting harder and harder to take so much time off to do it all, since I'm training to be a firefighter," he said i2002. He also wanted to become an emergency medical technician, he said then.

Since that time, Justin did become an emergency medical technician for Eastern Plumas Health Care in Portola, Calif., and he also worked as a volunteer firefighter in Gardnerville. It was from a fellow firefighter that he learned about his current adventure, being a contracted firefighter in Iraq, where he's been since November 2006.

"I was excited about the experience and the adventure to see the world and be able to help the soldiers who are protecting our freedom," he said in an e-mail from his base outside of Baghdad. "When I first got here, it was quite a shock. I'm in a different country, in a war zone and away from home. Before I headed to Iraq, I'd only been across the Mexican border. Now, I've been to Switzerland, Paris, Dubai, England, and Germany."

Justin, now 25, said his base has been hit by mortars off and on, but he generally feels safe and enjoys his work. Right now, he makes more money than he could ever earn here as a firefighter, but he is reluctant to name a dollar figure.

"The pay is something I'm not so proud of, due to making more than the fighting soldier," he said in an e-mail. "If you work here a year, the pay is probably equal to working three full-time office jobs."

One of the hardest things about being in Iraq, Justin said, is learning that his dad, Bob, now 58, had recently decided to go to Baghdad as a heavy equipment operator.

"I knew which site he was headed to, which gets hit now and then," Justin said. "I now know what I put my dad through when I first came over."

Bob says he, too, worried when Justin said he wanted to go to Iraq.

"I knew that if I said 'Don't go,' he wouldn't, but I would never not let him have this opportunity," Bob said in an e-mail. "He wanted to do his part to support our troops and I support his decision. As far as worry goes, I tried not to let Justin see how worried I was ... but in the first year, I didn't sleep more than four hours a night."

Justin will be home for Christmas in Carson Valley this year and may sign up for a third year in Iraq, he hasn't decided yet. His father won't be home until February, so this month Justin was able to go to Baghdad and see his dad before heading home.

"The best memories I have in the eight years of doing the food drives is working with my dad," Justin wrote. "We stayed up a lot of late nights, and donating to local organizations was a great time for both of us. To see the smiles and sometimes tears gave us more inspiration."

One of the reasons Justin may opt out of Iraq is because he realizes many of his friends are settling down, although his unattached status does make it easy to stay there. When and if he does have children, he says he hopes to find something he can share with them, something like the birdhouse project he and his father shared.

"But is has to be something the want to do, not forced to do," he e-mailed on Sunday. "The important thing with children is to give them your most important asset. Your time. My dad taught me that."