Florida filmmaker Derek Sanchez had never met Jim "Red" Heeres, but hearing his wife Tiffany (DeCheney) Sanchez, who took Red's Self-Discovery class at Whitehall High School, talk about him and what that class meant to her convinced him that not only should Red's story be told, he was the person to help tell it.
Derek is the founder of Inspired Films, which creates content for corporate videos, social media, events, commercials and more.
Like many others who took Heeres' class, which given increased awareness of mental health matters was decades ahead of its time in many ways, Tiffany still has the notebook she used for it. Heeres once told her she had "a gentle spirit about her," and whether he knew it or not, Tiffany badly needed to hear that message; it's stuck with her to this day.
"His famous line was, 'You are precious and worth 100 points,'" Derek Sanchez said. "I started researching the fan page (on Facebook) and all the people talking about this guy. I thought, there's a story here that should be shared. It's a lifetime of impact here. That's where it all sparked."
Sanchez has already conducted an interview with, and collected footage of, Heeres from a visit over the winter and is launching a crowdfunding effort to help deliver the rest of the project, which he's fittingly titled "Red: A Journey of Self-Discovery." The planned final product will include not just Heeres' thoughts, but many more interviews with those inspired by him. (Those interested in contributing can visit www.redthefilm.com.)
Heeres becoming a teacher would've seemed like a long shot earlier in his life. Troy Love, who became close with Heeres while both were Whitehall teachers and remains so today, said Heeres only narrowly graduated from Western Michigan Christian High School and "could barely read or write" when he did. Despite that, he already had the makings of a coach; he was the JV boys basketball coach for WMC the year after he graduated.
After serving in the Korean War, Heeres went to college largely because it would be paid for through the GI Bill and he wanted to play basketball, his first love.
"He played at Muskegon (Community College), and after one semester, you had to have a 1.75 GPA to stay eligible for the next semester, and he came in at a 1.75," Love chuckled. "There's never been anyone so excited to have a 1.75 GPA, because he could play ball."
Those struggles in the classroom didn't stick, though, and Heeres went from MCC to Central Michigan University, got his degree in 1962, and became a teacher and coach at Whitehall for the next 48 years. He coached several sports - football, basketball, baseball and softball among them. He was the first coach for the school's softball team; the field was named for him in 2005 and rededicated when the new fields were built in 2013.
In the classroom, he helmed U.S. History and his Self-Discovery class he launched in 1979, through which he had positive impacts on so many. The Facebook group Sanchez referenced has over 2,400 members and continues to be very active, with many wishing him a happy birthday - his 91st - on March 31.
"It never dawned on me that it was a job," Heeres said of teaching. "I met some wonderful young people. It was great to share with them and see them respond. It never entered my mind that it was a job or that I couldn't wait to give it up."
Heeres recalled one of his favorite memories of his Self-Discovery class. One year, a boy in his class approached another boy and declared that since they'd had a fight in fourth grade, they'd never liked one another. However, he declared that he'd realized his dislike was more internal than it was due to the other boy, and he wanted to move past it.
"They embraced in front of the whole class," Heeres said. "There weren't many dry eyes among those students. The essence of life is relationships, and those happen with reconciliation. To see those young people (following) those words was wonderful."
Among many awards he won during his career, Heeres won a statewide teacher of the year award from the American Legion in the late 1980s. Heeres in fact made such marks as a coach and educator that he has received the Lifetime Service Award from both the Muskegon Area Sports Hall of Fame and the Whitehall Sports Hall of Fame; the latter was the Whitehall HOF's first such award.
Heeres so loved his career that he once told the Muskegon Chronicle the only reason he retired when he did, in 2010, is that otherwise another teacher on staff, who had a young family, would have lost their job; Heeres never married or had children. His absence, though, didn't last long. He returned to the school in the second semester of the very next school year to teach more Self-Discovery classes.
Teaching didn't stop when the school year was over, either. Heeres also spent decades teaching swim classes at the White Lake Yacht Club, and also taught Bible studies at White Lake Assisted Living. Love said Heeres' students ranged from ages 2, at those swim lessons, to 103 at the Bible studies.
"He was able to capture the hearts of every one of his students," Love said. "There's no way I can describe in words what sitting under his teaching is like. It's unlike anything I've ever seen. I was a 30-year public school teacher, and I've never seen anything like it."
Like Heeres, Love is deeply invested in his faith; he's active at The Ladder Community Center in Shelby and at the Evangelical Covenant Church in Whitehall. The two men's friendship deepened when Love began attending a weekly Bible study Heeres had in his classroom for any interested Whitehall teachers prior to school on Fridays.
Eventually, Love learned from a men's retreat he attended that a great way to grow in faith was to ask someone to pray with them, and for them, each day for a year. Love asked Heeres, and the two men connected every day for not just one year, but decades. (Love even got Heeres a cell phone to facilitate the prayers when they couldn't connect in person.) Even now, with Heeres in his 90s and less active physically than he once was, it's a standing appointment for them.
"He's prayed with me and for me every day for 20 years," Love said. "When you pray with someone every day for 20 years, you get to know their heart. I've been blessed with the gift of Red, who's been willing to invest in me for 20 years."
Heeres' Bible studies, Love said, have led to innumerable acts of service from people who participated - mission trips, careers as a pastor, the establishment of faith-based ministries all over the globe.
"Here's this guy who lives on a corner in little old Whitehall, no family in the neighborhood, never been married, and he's impacted the entire globe, every continent, for the kingdom of God," Love said.
It's that faith that informed Love's reaction when Sanchez approached him with the idea for the documentary.
"I do believe it is an act of God," Love said. "I believe God has put this on Derek Sanchez to do this documentary at just the right time, just in time to capture Red's story, which is one of a kind and inspiring. I know God has a hand on this."
Sanchez, too, feels prodded by divine forces to tell Heeres' story.
"It's a journey we all find ourselves in at one point or another," Sanchez said, referring to self-discovery. "Red believes, and my wife and I believe, it's ultimately a pursuit of who Christ made us to be. We find Jesus at the end of it. This life is not about ourselves. While we reflect on ourselves, it's to live for Him, serve Him and serve the people around us."
Even at the center of a film project, though, Heeres remains humble, even bemused by all the attention. Love said when he showed Heeres the trailer Sanchez created for his film (viewable at redthefilm.com), Heeres' reaction was a simple, "I wondered what he was going to do with that stuff."
As Love sees it, Heeres didn't agree to the film to cement some sort of personal legacy. He did it for the same reason he's done so many other things in his life - with a goal of reaching people on a human level. He can reach them best through his voice, as he did during his teaching career. Even adults like Love - he said that while teaching, he took Heeres' class five times by attending it during his hour off - stand to benefit.
"I've never been in a class (like his,) where students lean in," Love said. "It's like they hang on every single word. That's a dynamic that I'm not sure you could get from reading words on paper. In this documentary, people will be able to hear Red's voice. When you see this documentary, it will cause you to lean in and soak in everything that is shared...Every single person will be a better human being when they're done watching it.
"The fact that his story is going to be captured in a documentary is powerful, and so needed."
