He’s a master gardener. He’s a master composter. He’s a master preserver. And Tom Cree is a real hero to Anne Zander, family and consumer science agent at the Extension Office in the Boulder County Parks and Open Space Department.

“Tom’s work with the Open Pantry Shop at the fair for the last several years has been stupendous,” Zander said. “He’s gone beyond the call of duty to get more people to enter and to increase cash prizes — pounding the pavement to get them from merchants. He’s a gem.”

After a long career at IBM, Cree retired 10 years ago. But “retired” is hardly the word for Cree. He says he’s doing just what he loves these days and does it all because “it’s fun.”

The Pantry Shop is what all the food-preservation entries at the Boulder County Fair are called. That covers jams, jellies, canned fruit and veggies, canned salsa, pickles, dried foods and honey products.

Cree’s success last year at getting donations of nearly $1,000 in additional prize money was appreciated by folks who entered 243 items at the 2006 fair. He and Carl Armon share the organizational work of the Pantry Shop, with Armon being the chair and Cree the assistant — the result of a coin toss, he recalls.

Cree had done a study of other nearby county fairs and found that Larimer and Weld had sponsors. He decided that would be a great way to increase prize money. Many of the merchants Cree approached said they had wanted to do something like this for a long time. “It was really easy to get them to give,” Cree said.

For information about volunteering with Boulder County Parks and Open Space or other agencies, call the Volunteer Connection at 303-444-4904, or go to our Volunteer Central.