Eugene lost a hero Monday – though many of us never heard of him until reading his obituary.

But Jim Bumpas, 53, was well known to hundreds of kids he coached on baseball and soccer teams. He was invaluable to the students and staff at Parker Elementary School where he volunteered. He was unforgettable to the youngsters in his southeast Eugene neighborhood, to whom he’d hit fly balls for hours on end.

"He’d go down to Kincaid Park with a ball and bat and kids would come out of nowhere," recalled longtime friend Sally Ruxton, who coached Kidsports soccer alongside Bumpas. "He’d nail pop fly after pop fly, for hours on end – not just for his own sons, or the kids on his team, but for any kid who showed up."

He wasn’t directly known, perhaps, by the hundreds of kids whose adoption and custody cases he handled in his family law practice. But they, too, were beneficiaries of a man who clearly had his priorities straight.

"He put children first in both his lawyering and his personal life," said Carol Chadwick, a fellow attorney who rented Bumpas his law office. "Adoption work was one of his favorite things to do – he and his wife had adopted a son, so it was very close to his heart. And in his divorce cases, he always focused on what it does to children, much more strongly than most attorneys."

Jeannine Bertrand, principal at Parker, recalls Bumpas reaching into his own wallet to help kids pay sports registration fees. But his volunteerism went far beyond sports. As a member of the school’s site council, he worked to stretch shrinking budgets while prodding the school to better serve its community – particularly children.

"If something was good for kids, it was good, as far as Jim was concerned," Bertrand said.

"There are lots of wonderful fathers who are involved with their own kids," Ruxton agreed. "But Jim felt all kids should have opportunities. He would drive other people’s kids to things they couldn’t otherwise make."

Not that he wasn’t devoted to his own sons, Aden, 13, and Arik, 11, and to Linda, his wife of nearly 30 years.

"Every morning Linda would drive Jim and the kids to Parker in the minivan," Bertrand recalled. "He’d ride to school with the family, then put on his helmet and gloves and hop on his bike for the commute to work…"

Her voice choked off, and she paused a minute to compose herself.

"I suspect he left from the school just to extend his time with his family," she finally concluded.

"Sometimes we label certain professionals. Well, Jim sure turned around my opinion of attorneys. He was just a decent human being."

Bumpas focused on others even as he confronted death, she said.

"He called me in January and I almost fell off my chair when he told me he had lung cancer," the principal said. "He said, ‘I’m calling you because my doctor lays this to secondhand smoke (both his parents were smokers) – I want to start a campaign among schoolchildren about the effects of secondhand smoke.’"

Unfortunately, the cancer moved too quickly for him to accomplish that goal personally.

He did recruit a replacement coach for his baseball team this spring, coaching the players as long as he could, even hooked up to an oxygen tank, until his illness forced him into the hospital a month ago.

Such dedication is just one reason Bumpas received a Lifetime Service Award from Kidsports.

No one could be more deserving, Ruxton said.

"The guy could say nothing but positives," she said.

Chadwick admired the way Bumpas balanced work and family.

"I never figured out his secret, but I’d always see him pack his sports bag and wheel out on his bike about the time school let out," she said.

His office walls were papered with pictures of his Kidsports teams, but he was proudest of a poem written years ago by his son, Aden: "My Dad is special because he takes me places, buys me things and coaches the baseball team. When my Mom will not take me places, my Dad will, or if my Mom does not want to go on a bike ride, my dad will. He is a Great Dad and a special one, too."

Chadwick has established a trust fund for Aden’s and Arik’s educations. Donations to the account, No. 2470024536, may be made at any branch of US Bank.

Ruxton, meanwhile, is hoping that many of the kids who were so important to Bumpas will be at today’s memorial service, 6:30 p.m. at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church.

"He was a great role model," she said. "He only got to be a father for 13 years, but he set an example those kids will never forget about parenting. Jim’s an excellent example of what we could use a whole world of."

 -- By Karen McCowan