As for my new favorite Chrysler-Jeep dealer, he says it was nothing -- which is a genteel lie, and if you want to tell him so, he's at 23951 Plymouth Road in Redford.

Last Sunday I wrote about Jake Jr., who was born with an odd condition in which his eyes open barely a slit. He needs $8,000 worth of surgery, and since the Amish don't hold with modern trappings like Medicaid and Blue Cross, his prospects seemed less than promising.

Gordon, who lives in Ann Arbor, knows the two Jakes because she employs a few of their relatives at a small furniture company in southwest Michigan. She talked Jake the Dad into letting her raffle off a queen-sized, handmade Amish quilt, hoping that 1,600 people might chance $5 apiece to help.

By Tuesday, she had received 500 checks, ranging in size from $5 to my-heart-can't-take-this. By Wednesday, Ann Arbor accountant Len Pytlak had stepped in free of charge, logging donations and setting up the Jake Jr. Amish Quilt Raffle as an honest-to-goodness nonprofit. By Thursday, Jake Jr. had a Dec. 13 date with a surgeon at C.S. Mott Children's Hospital.

"I'm still shaking," says Gordon, 54. When she reached Jake Sr. by phone -- a process that involved a call to her Branch Hill Joinery in Montgomery, followed by two long buggy rides -- he was grateful, gracious and almost embarrassed.

In Macomb, Corinne Buchbinder enclosed a note with her contribution. "I am sending this check because my grandchildren are perfect," she said, "and I want Jake Jr. to be perfect, too."

In South Lyon, Mary Runner, 82, bought four raffle tickets and enclosed photos of her great-grandson. "He had the same problem. He had laser surgery on his eyelids. The scars have gone away and he is doing just fine."

In Warren, the kids at Westview Elementary sold $150 worth of lollipops on Jake's behalf. In Ann Arbor, a friend of Gordon's gave $5,000. And at Snethkamp Chrysler-Jeep, co-owner Dave Hines wrote a check for a beefy $10,000.

Hines, 59, wasn't born wealthy, and he didn't get that way just by marrying the daughter of a car dealer. He has worked hard, he says, as has his wife, the former Mary Snethkamp, who taught high school English and journalism in Detroit for 30 years.

"I have a soft spot for Amish people in general," says Hines, even if they'll never become customers. "There are a lot of people who talk a spiritual game, but few that live it, and they live their religion."

Besides, he couldn't pass up the chance to make a clear, visible difference, and he was hoping to get a chance to tell me about his pet charity, St. Peter's Home for Boys.

Grateful as I am for his help with Jake Jr., alas, I can't possibly spare the space to mention that St. Peter's is a home and treatment center for teenage wards of the court in Detroit, that its on-site school focuses on literacy and arts, and that its goal is to break the cycle of abuse and poverty for promising kids who need someone to believe in them.

Maybe some other time. The important thing now is that Jake Jr. has enough money for this operation and the follow-up he'll need in a few years. Any leftover donations, Gordon says, will go to another Michigan child who needs eye or eyelid surgery his family can't pay for.

"We'll let everybody know where the money goes," she promises, and once the raffle winner's name is drawn Dec. 13, Jake Jr.'s mom and her sisters will get busy crafting the quilt to order. Anyone who still wants a ticket can send a $5 check to Jake Jr. Amish Quilt Raffle, 424 Little Lake Drive No. 7, Ann Arbor, MI 48103.

Hines doesn't know it, but the Schwartzes are planning to make him a quilt, too. Chances are he'll just fold it into a fine Chrysler automobile and take it to St. Peter's.

This is cache, read story here