Renovating kids' bikes brings Lawton man blissful aim

LAWTON — John Paul Miller gives kids freedom on two wheels.

Miller, the caretaker at Ron Stephens Stadium, retired City of Lawton employee and former electrical contractor, rebuilds bicycles in his spare time. Then he gives them away, mostly to children.

Miller got started in his unusual hobby when he worked for the city. He was following the example of a co-worker, Harold Davis, who had been rebuilding bikes and giving them to children for years.

"I watched him and the joy he got out of it,” Miller said. "I began to do it to see if I could find that.”

He already knew how to repair bicycles, a skill he learned from his older brother when he was a boy. So Miller took in bikes no one wanted and fixed them.

Then he found kids who needed bikes. Miller said he has given away hundreds of bikes.

Lately, he's been too busy to work on them much, but he still finds time to tinker. He has bicycles and parts in his garage at home and works on some of them in the field house at Ron Stephens Stadium, with the permission of his boss.

Unwanted bicycles often find their way to Miller's workplace.

Most of them need work. Some of them are easy to fix; others are only good for salvaging parts.

The biggest problem Miller faces in continuing his work with bicycles is the rising cost of parts, compared to the cost of new bikes.

A new bicycle at a chain discount store costs about $40, Miller said. So it doesn't make good financial sense for him to spend a lot of money repairing old bikes.

Miller sometimes works with churches and charities to find people who need his bikes. He worked with the Salvation Army for a while.

Although he prefers working with children, Miller also has repaired and given away adult bikes. In particular, he has given bicycles to recently released prison inmates so they can get to work and appointments.