When George Weyrens died in Eugene in 2001, there were no headlines.

George's quiet death suited his quiet life. He never ran for office, won an award, attracted attention. He never threw a party, had a date, made a friend.

It might sound harsh to say nobody wanted George, but if you look at the facts, it's hard to dispute. George's brain worked slowly. You can think of the names he might have been called when he was a child in the 1920s in Minnesota. After he died, accounts of his life called him "developmentally disabled."

George was only 6 when his father died. His mother may have been ill and chose not to raise her son, who was sent to live with relatives. He was not sent to school.

But when George was a young teenager, he got a lucky break. A woman named Rose Mertz, an unmarried schoolteacher, agreed to let George live with her. George's older brother paid Rose to house George and tutor him.

George worked hard. He learned to read and write. In his late teens, George enrolled in junior high school. When he was 24, in 1942, he got his high school degree in St. Cloud, Minn.

George wrote to his brother, Peter, in 1942, "I sure have to thank Miss Mertz to have made it possible for me to reach this goal. As you know, I had no foundation and no place to start from, which required a great deal of help the first few years -- which she gave generously.

"The last year I plugged away with a great deal of pride in my work. My name was on the honor roll in the newspaper. Miss Mertz bought me a class ring ... her friends remembered my graduation with worthwhile gifts."

Soon after George graduated, he came home one day, and Rose Mertz was dead.

"Nobody in Minnesota wanted anything to do with him," says Marc Perrin, who was George's attorney for many years before he died.

George's brother bought him a train ticket and shipped him to Eugene to live with distant relatives.

"When Rose died, it was probably a horribly scary situation," Marc says. "He overcame all the obstacles."

George found a job at a bakery. Eventually, he was hired as a night janitor at the University of Oregon. He moved to an apartment on Olive Street, a walk-up in an old house.

George lived frugally. "He had no TV," Marc says. "He had a radio, which he listened to religiously. He had one fork, one knife, one spoon, one plate, one glass, a frying pan and a pot. That was the entirety of his kitchenware."

His apartment held a dresser, a bed and an old steamer trunk he'd brought from Minnesota, Marc says.

George lived in the same apartment for decades. He went everywhere on foot or by bus. He never had a driver's license or a car. He never owned a bike. His only clothes were his custodial uniforms.

Soon after he moved to Eugene, George opened a savings account and deposited money regularly. Since he spent almost nothing, the account grew.

George was shy. He was so shy, he avoided eye contact. He didn't interact with people at work or at his church. He often walked down alleys, looking down, his face shielded by a baseball cap, to avoid others.

"He was a nonentity," Marc says, "pushing dust bunnies in the back of a room in Emerald Hall. The job was perfect for him; he never had to deal with any human interaction."

George did his own grocery shopping, paid his bills, prepared meals, did his own laundry.

Still, his relatives in Eugene took him to court in the 1970s, seeking to have him declared mentally incompetent so they could become his guardians.

George represented himself before Lane County Circuit Court Judge Ed Allen.

"He showed the judge he had a job, he had a place to live and he had money in the bank," Marc says. "At that point, George was working for the U of O and making about $13,000 a year." His savings account held more than $60,000.

The judge "was of the opinion that if a fellow could be self-supporting and have more in the bank than the judge had," Marc says, then he was mentally fit. George won the case.

After trial, George approached the attorney who had represented his relatives, John Joseph. George became John's client. In the 1980s, John's associate, Marc Perrin, took over George's legal affairs.

At first Marc helped George with his taxes. Later, he helped George negotiate retirement.

When George retired in 1987, he was 68 years old and his eyesight had started to go bad, Marc says. By then George had managed to save about $120,000. "As a result, when the time came that he needed care, he had the money, because he'd saved it."

After George's retirement, Marc checked in on him. He hired a housekeeper for George, he arranged for meals to be delivered and he'd visit his client.

"He was a really, really nice guy. He wouldn't hurt a fly. Just a sweet old man."

And except for Marc, he was completely alone.

In time, Marc helped George move to a retirement home. "His world really opened up," says Marc, who would visit George every week. "He met people, eating in the common dining area."

George fell in love with television. "He loved nature shows and CNN. His favorite thing to watch was the British House of Commons in session. ... He'd giggle out loud, listening to them insult each other."

In time, Marc moved George into a foster care home. Marc continued his weekly visits, even though George found it very hard to talk.

When George died in 2001, what money he had left went to pay bills, cover his burial and give small gifts to George's church and a charity.

That left $22,000. George had asked Marc to determine who would get the money. Marc decided that George, who'd lived such a good, quiet life, deserved permanent recognition.

So he gave the money to the University of Oregon, added $3,000 of his own money and created a scholarship endowment in George's name.

But so far, no scholarship has been given. The endowment has not grown large enough to begin offering students funds from its proceeds.

If George Weyrens had been an outgoing man, it's possible more people would have contributed to the endowment named for him.

Instead he was a quiet man, a good man. Marc Perrin believes George never missed a day of work.

"He never did drugs, I never saw him use alcohol, he never committed a crime," Marc says. "He worked hard, but he was just a shadow" on the campus.

"Now here's an opportunity to create something in his name that could live on forever." A scholarship named for a man whose name almost no one ever knew.

To contribute to the George Weyrens Scholarship Fund, send checks payable to "UO Foundation" to University of Oregon Foundation, 360 E. 10th Ave., Suite 202, Eugene, OR 97401. Note that the check is for the Weyrens fund.

To donate online, go to www.uofoundation.org/gift/cash.php

-- Margie Boule; marboule@aol.com