John Proctor, Hero or Stooge?

In my eyes John Proctor is a hero. At the end of the book he gives his life for the good of the community. He may not have known it at the time but by not confessing or "blackening" his name in the village John showed the town the idiocy of the whole set of trails. When people of the town saw John Proctor hanged that struck a chord in many people who had known him as a good man. When something bad happens to a person you know to be nice, kind and good that automatically provokes sympathy and "why them" seems to be said at one time or another. I think that the extreme of this is during John Proctor's hanging. As he said in the story he "hung the door on the church" and put the roof on it. In a Puritan life those are very prestigious deeds to do. The argument of stooge is a valid argument but, I think that by the end of the story Proctor showed himself to be a hero.