Profile 2017

Profi le

2017

What’s inside: PERSON OF THE YEAR Pelham native Swinney leads Tigers to title

FINDING HER CALLING Walker overcomes struggles to find success

‘HE IS LIVING HISTORY’ Johnson recalls Civil Rights-era Birmingham

A special publication of Shelby County Newspapers, Inc.

Growing to serve!

Mayor Tony Picklesimer City Council Tiffany Bittner, David Ingram, Casey Morris, Cody Sumners, Scott Weygand

c i t y o f c h e l s e a . c o m

Thanks to our $9 million investment, he’s breathing a little easier.

Our recently completed $9 million upgrade to our North Shelby Water Resource Reclamation Facility has dramatically reduced the amount of phosphorus in the clean water we return to the Cahaba River.

That means we haven’t just met or surpassed all state and federal health standards. We’ve also helped lower the likelihood of algal blooms, which rob wildlife of life-giving oxygen in the water.

And that’s just one of the ways we’re working to make ours a better, healthier community, along with supporting organizations like Big Brothers Big Sisters of Shelby County, and SafeHouse of Shelby County, among many others.

Our pledge to you: we’ll keep working for a healthier river, and a healthier community. Which means we can all breathe a little easier.

To learn more, visit CleanerCahaba.info

E

very year, the staff of Shelby County Newspapers, Inc. spends countless hours preparing to tell the top stories our great county has to offer through our annual Profile publication.

This year’s Profile represents a variety of stories I hope will inspire all of us to become more involved our incredible central Alabama communities. There was little debate about who we chose to name as our person of the year this year. Pelham native and current Clemson University head coach Dabo Swinney has made waves throughout the collegiate football landscape over the past several years, culminating with a victory over his alma mater, Alabama, in January.

Read about his incredible journey on Page 6. We’ve all made bad decisions at some point in our lives, and how we move forward from those mistakes is what defines us. Helena resident Angela Blackwell knows this better than most, as she hit the low point in her life in the mid-2000s while battling addiction and homelessness. Thanks

to the Shelby County Drug Court and a fierce will to get her life back on track, Blackwell now holds regular speaking engagements to share her success story with others. Read how Blackwell turned her life around starting on Page 60. Over the past few decades, Briarwood Christian School’s football program has been synonymous with two things: Success and Fred Yancey. Since taking the helm of the Lions’ football program in 1990, Yancey has led the program to the highest of highs and sustained success. Read about how he got to where he is today on Page 104.

-When Rick Vanderslice learned he had terminal cancer, doctors predicted he would live only a few months longer. That was more than a year ago, and Vanderslice is now completely cancer free. Read the family’s story on Page 71.

As you can see, our county has plenty of fantastic stories to tell.

We hope you enjoy getting a more in-depth look at our county, but more than that, we hope you are inspired to make Shelby County a better place for all. 

Profi le 2017

Shelby County EDITORIAL Graham Brooks Stephen Dawkins Baker Ellis Alec Etheredge Briana Harris Amalia Kortright Keith McCoy Emily Sparacino Neal Wagner CONTRIBUTORS Grace Thornton PRODUCTION Connor Bucy Jamie Dawkins Clarke Stackhouse MARKETING Meagan Barton Kristy Brown Ellie Frederick Ashley Murphy Kari George Daniel Holmes Stacey Meadows Rhett McCreight Kim McCulla

Neal Wagner, Managing Editor

April Spivey

Neal.Wagner@ShelbyCountyReporter.com

Jessica Spradlin

on the cover Clemson University head football coach Dabo Swinney, a Pelham native, celebrates after winning the college football national championship in January.

Cover design: Jamie Dawkins Photography: Contributed

Kerrie Thompson ADMINISTRATION Tim Prince Katie McDowell Mary Jo Eskridge Hailey Dolbare

Shelby County Newspapers, Inc. P.O. Box 947 Columbiana, AL 35051 205.669.3131 4

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VIEW FROM THE TOP Successful college football coach grateful for local roots

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A LABOR OF LOVE Barefields head support of National Cemetery

FINDING HER CALLING Walker clears hurdles to find success

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SAVED FROM SIN After bad decisions, Aaron Knight gains redemption

ALABASTER CITY SCHOOLS Champions for our future AGAINST ALL ODDS Smith overcomes adversity to become successful businesswoman LIVING LIFE TO THE FULLEST Middle-schooler wages courageous cancer battle ‘HE IS LIVING HISTORY’ Johnson lives through hardships to become symbol of Pelham

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GETTING A SECOND CHANCE Blackwell conquers drug addiction to become pharmacist

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PELHAM CITY SCHOOLS We inspire. We empower.

We achieve. We are Pelham.

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BUILDING A MIRACLE Community comes together as man beats terminal diagnosis

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A TRUE SERVANT’S HEART Harpersville’s Theoangelo Perkins ends more than 20 years of service to hometown

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HOPE FOR THE HOPELESS Briarwood grad’s ministry making an impact on Native American reservation

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FROM CLEATS TO CLUBS Former county resident Al DelGreco succeeds in multiple roles

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SHELBY COUNTY SCHOOLS Every student a graduate.

Every graduate prepared.

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THEN AND NOW A look at some of the historic locations in Shelby County and how the march of time has affected these locations

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THE PATRIARCH Briarwood legend isn’t slowing down

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CALERA GOES PRINK Meet the force behind the movement 5

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Successful college football coach grateful for local roots Story by STEPHEN DAWKINS Photographs CONTRIBUTED

D

abo Swinney has reached the mountaintop of college football, but he remembers well where his journey began.

The head coach for Clemson University’s football team, Swinney led the Tigers to their first national championship since 1981 with a 35-31 win over the University of Alabama on Monday, Jan. 9 at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida.

Swinney’s love for sports, passion for winning and care for people were formed during his early years in Pelham.

Before graduating from Pelham High School in 1988, Swinney played receiver and cornerback in football, point guard in basketball and shortstop and pitcher in baseball.

Swinney grew up a fan of the Crimson Tide and wanted to attend the University of Alabama and pursue a career as a walk-on, or non-scholarship player, but he was not sure which sport.

He approached the decision logically.

“They didn’t give full scholarships for baseball, and in basketball there are only five guys on the court at a time. I felt like I had the best path in football.”

Swinney was able to walk on for the UA football team. He remembers fondly the first game he had the opportunity to play in—against Southern Miss in 1989— but Swinney’s passion for the game and sports in general went beyond playing time.

“I loved the first day I got to be part of the team, the first team meeting, the first practice,” he said. “My Profile 2017

whole life I had been a big Alabama fan. I took it and ran with it. The friendships and the relationships were special.”

But then it came to an end—or so it seemed.

After earning a degree from the university, Swinney was completing an internship in the spring of 1993 and had been offered a job in Birmingham in the health care management field.

But head coach Gene Stallings offered Swinney a position as a graduate assistant and later as a full-time assistant coach.

“I had never really thought about [coaching],” Swinney said. “That was the first time I hadn’t been part of a team, and coach [Gene] Stallings said, ‘You start in July.’

“It was easier for me to call and turn down the job I had been offered.

“Almost immediately, I knew. All of a sudden I had clarity. God gave me clarity. All of a sudden it made my entire life and my journey make sense.”

‘I MAKE A POINT TO MAKE SURE WE HAVE FUN’ Swinney was dismissed from Alabama along with all of former head coach Mike DuBose’s staff in early 2001, but after holding a real estate job for a time, Swinney was hired to coach receivers at Clemson in 2003.

Swinney was named Clemson’s interim coach upon the firing of former coach Tommy Bowden in October 2008. After a strong finish to the season, including a win over rival South Carolina, the interim tag was removed in December 2008.

LEFT: Clemson coach Dabo Swinney celebrates with Hunter Renfrow during the College Football Playoff National Championship.

ABOVE LEFT: Dabo Swinney (far left) and wife Kathleen are shown with close friends Joni Hayes (third from left) and Rick Hayes. ABOVE RIGHT: Jim Phillips and Dabo Swinney have a friendship that stretches back to when Swinney was a 13-yearold athlete at Riverchase Middle School.

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ABOVE: Swinney congratulates a player during a game. BELOW: Swinney’s outgoing personality and success have made him a fan favorite at Clemson.

“He went through some hard

times and left Alabama and I’m sure some people told him he needed to do something else, but he wouldn’t have any of it. He’s just that kind of guy.”

— Helena Mayor Mark Hall

DABO’S PATH TO SUCCESS 1990-1992 Nov. 20, 1969 Christopher “Dabo” Swinney was born in Birmingham.

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1988 Graduated from Pelham High School.

Earned a scholarship and lettered on three teams including the 1992 National Championship team.

1995 Received his master’s degree in business administration and was hired as a full-time assistant coach for Alabama.

2001-2002 Worked for AIG Baker Real Estate as a developmental real estate agent.

1969-1988

1989

1993

2001

2003

Grew up in Pelham.

Walk-on wide receiver at the University of Alabama.

Received degree in commerce and business administration.

Swinney was fired along with all of head coach Mike DuBose’s staff.

Former position coach at Alabama, Tommy Bowden, hires Swinney as an assistant football coach at Clemson.

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Under Swinney, Clemson has finished 9-5 in 2009, 6-7 in 2010, 10-3 in 2011, 11-2 in 2012, 11-2 in 2013, 10-3 in 2014, 14-1 in 2015 and 14-1 in 2016. The Tigers won Atlantic Coast Conference Championships in 2011, 2015 and 2016, and faced Alabama in the College Football Playoff National Championship Game in January 2016 (a 45-40 loss) and January 2017.

William Christopher Swinney’s name “Dabo” was given to him by his older brother, in trying to refer to “that boy.”

But Swinney himself is the one who has become known for introducing colorful language to the college football lexicon. An example, delivered after an emotional 24-22 win over Notre Dame in 2015: “It ain’t always perfect, but what I told them tonight was, ‘Listen, we give you scholarships, we give you stipends and meals and a place to live. We give you nice uniforms. I can’t give you guts, and I can’t give you heart.’ Tonight, it was B.Y.O.G.—bring your own guts. And they brought some guts and some heart, and they never quit until the last play.”

Perhaps no one was surprised when Swinney was caught on camera dancing in the locker room later.

“I make a point to make sure we have fun in our program,” Swinney said. “We’ve tried to create a culture that it’s OK to have some fun.”

‘DRIVE AND AMBITION LIKE NO OTHER’ Pelham resident and City Councilman Rick Hayes grew up with Swinney. Swinney’s father was Hayes’ first youth sports coach.

Swinney came back to Pelham to speak at a football banquet when Hayes’ father, Bobby, was leaving the mayor’s office after many years. Swinney calls Rick Hayes’ mother every Thursday before games on Saturday.

Hayes said he has lots of stories about Swinney, but many people do.

“He’s just that way,” Hayes said. “He has like 30 best friends because he’s just that way. No matter where he is or who he’s with

2016 Oct. 13, 2008 Swinney was named interim coach of the Tigers after Bowden resigned six games into the season.

2009 His first full year as a head coach in college football.

Signed a six-year contract extension, another 14-1 season that included an ACC Championship and this time he jumped the hurdle in a rematch National Championship win over Alabama.

Dec. 1, 2008

2015

Officially named as the new head coach of the Clemson Tigers.

In his seventh season at the school he led Clemson to a 14-1 recorded and an ACC Championship and appeared in the National Championship against his former team, the Crimson Tide.

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Dabo Swinney’s record as a head coach has steadily improved since he was named Clemson’s head coach six games into the 2008 season.

The Tigers have won at least 10 games each year since 2011.

2008: 2009: 2010: 2011: 2012: 2013: 2014: 2015: 2016: Swinney won his second Atlantic Coast Conference championship as head coach of Clemson in 2015.

or what he’s doing, he’s always going to be that ol’ boy from Pelham, Alabama.”

Helena Mayor Mark Hall said he had conflicting interests during the national championship game.

“I’m an Alabama graduate so obviously it was very hard for me to pull against the Crimson Tide, but with Dabo being the coach at Clemson, I’m as happy as if Alabama had won because I’m happy for him and for Tracy (Swinney’s brother) and for all the Swinney family,” said Hall, who has known Swinney and his family since 1981, dating back to Hall’s time with the Pelham Police Police Department, where he worked with Swinney’s brother Tracy.

Hall said Swinney is the same person today as he was when he was a freshman at Alabama and has not forgotten where he came from.

“He’s got a drive and ambition like no other person I’ve ever met and nothing could discourage him from his course of becoming a head coach in the college ranks,” Hall said. “He went through some hard times and left Alabama and I’m sure some people told him he needed to do something else, but he wouldn’t have any of it.

He’s just that kind of guy.”

‘A GREAT EXPERIENCE HERE AT CLEMSON’ Swinney has found that there is much more to being the face of a major college football program than there

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was to that graduate assistant position Swinney first accepted.

“There has always been pressure (to succeed), but where we are now, it’s just unbelievable—the scrutiny, the amount of pressure, the things to deal with and the world the players are growing up in,” Swinney said.

Swinney said he has been successful in the face of such pressure and demands because of a measured approach.

“I’ve been able to surround myself with good people—great young men and making the right decisions about my staff,” he said. “Then you have to be able to articulate a vision for the program and get people to buy into that.

“I’ve had great support from the administration for how we want things to be, and we’ve just tried to create a culture one day at a time, one graduate at a time.”

Swinney said his primary goals are for players to graduate and leave the program equipped with the skills they need to succeed in life, and to win a championship.

Of the 135 seniors since Swinney has been coach at Clemson, 129 have graduated, he said.

“These kids are having a great experience here at Clemson, and they can’t wait to come back,” he said.

Swinney is having a great experience at Clemson, too, but those who grew up with him know he will always be an “ol’ boy from Pelham” at heart.  Staff Writer Graham Brooks contributed to this report.

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Finding her calling Walker clears hurdles to find success Story by EMILY SPARACINO Photographs by KEITH MCCOY

H Despite experiencing challenges with reading as a child, Walker realized she loved to write. She wrote poetry and other pieces, sometimes submitting them for contests.

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er apple should have looked more like an apple.

Dr. Angela Walker’s first memory of struggling in school dates back to her first-grade teacher’s reaction to her work from a coloring activity.

“I can remember all the kids coming in,” Walker said. “The first thing we had to do was color this apple. I had just made mine all different colors.”

After seeing Walker’s multi-colored apple next to her classmates’ red apples, her teacher picked up her paper, wadded it into a ball and told her it was supposed to look more like an apple.

“One person – one teacher – can make such a difference,” Walker said.

The color of the apple is insignificant now, but the emotional impact of the incident has stayed with Walker, and in many ways, has contributed to her approach to education.

Walker, 49, who serves as the professional development supervisor for Shelby County Schools, has overcome setbacks that could have broken her spirit and shattered her faith before she ever had a chance to walk across a stage to receive a diploma.

But multiple diplomas line a wall in her office at the Shelby County Schools Instructional Services Center in Alabaster.

The framed documents emblazoned with Walker’s name represent degrees she has earned, Profile 2017

years of studying she has logged and, ultimately, the educational peak she was once told she likely wouldn’t reach.

Her experiences, however painful they are to relive in memory or conversation, are what drive Walker to get out of bed every morning and try to make a difference for other educators, students and students’ families.

Walker was hired for her current position in 2013.

God’s preparations for her, though, started several decades ago.

CHILDHOOD EXPERIENCES In addition to the incident with her multicolored apple in the first grade, Walker said she also realized she had trouble reading, and “couldn’t read like other kids.”

A reading teacher named Fannie Heinz started pulling her out of class to work one-on-one with her.

“I would lie down and kick and scream,” Walker said. “I didn’t want anything to do with reading.”

When Walker calmed down after a tantrum one day, Heinz opened a Dick and Jane reader and asked her to describe what she saw in the book’s illustrations.

Walker did so, and Heinz said, ‘See, I knew you could read,’ and told Walker reading wasn’t limited to text on a page.

Walker described the meeting with Heinz as a “pivotal moment” in her life, a much-needed nugget of encouragement at a critical juncture.

Both of Walker’s parents had dropped out of school. Her mother, who she described as “very loving and supportive,” quit in the seventh grade. She became a beautician. Walker’s father dropped out in

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the sixth grade and became a truck driver.

“I think I just kind of glided along,” Walker said.

“I don’t think anybody realized I couldn’t read until middle school.”

Around the same time, her parents’ marriage started falling apart. The situation’s emotional effects on Walker manifested in behavioral changes.

“I acted out at school, I became a behavior problem, I skipped,” she said. “I was in the office all the time.”

Writing poetry was Walker’s outlet. The librarian at her school asked Walker to bring her writing to the library so she could display it.

She started writing different pieces and entering contests.

The more she wrote, the more she enjoyed writing.

Along with her reading issues, Walker had severe attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

As with her early years in school, the negative effects of her issues surfaced in her behavior.

A conversation with her government teacher one day made her realize she was falling short of her potential, and she was leading those who followed her along the same path of mediocrity.

“He said, ‘You are a leader ... but basically, you’re leading people in the wrong direction,’” Walker said.

As she made adjustments and started to feel better about school, Walker encountered another

“So many times, we

just want to look at the outside and discount people. The magic happens when you look past that and see the person. As educators, that’s what we’re called to do.”

— Angela Walker

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LEFT: Walker observes a class activity during a teacher evaluation at Forest Oaks Elementary. ABOVE: Much of Walker’s life has been dedicated to education. She holds a doctorate in early childhood and educational leadership from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. roadblock when she talked to her high school guidance counselor about applying for college.

“He told me I was not college material,” she said.

“I remember leaving his office being so deflated.”

Walker graduated and landed a job working with children. But thoughts of college continued to pervade her mind.

HONORS MATERIAL Walker drove to the Jefferson State Community College campus near Center Point, walked inside and told the women working in the office she wanted to go to college. One of the women helped Walker fill out the paperwork.

By then, Walker’s parents were divorced and likely had no idea she was enrolling.

She got into the child development program at Jeff State, but also got herself into an abusive marriage, she said.

On top of everything else, Walker’s mother – her “lifeline” – died as Walker was trying to finish her

ACCOLADES EDUCATION Doctor of Philosophy in Early Childhood/ Educational Leadership, UAB Education Administration Certification, UAB Master’s degree in Early Childhood, UAB Bachelor’s degree in Early Childhood, UAB Associate’s degree, Child Development, JSCC

AWARDS AND RECOGNITIONS Virginia Horns-Marsh Doctoral Scholarship recipient Published article in “Focus on Teacher Education” journal Student of the Year in Early Childhood at UAB Top 5 finalist for Alabama Teacher of the Year District III Teacher of the Year Teacher of the Year for Shelby County Teacher of the Year for Mt Laurel Elementary National Board for Professional Teaching Standards Certification Alabama National Board for Professional Teaching Standards Grant Recipient Shelby County Education Foundation Grant Recipient Student of the Year in Child Development at Jefferson State

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two-year degree.

“I didn’t think I could do everything,” she said, adding the stress of her circumstances led her to run out of class in tears.

Pam Lanning, Walker’s mentor teacher who was over the child development program, followed her out of the room and helped her develop a plan to finish the semester and graduate.

“I ended up graduating with honors, and I was the Student of the Year in the child development program,” Walker said. “That was huge. When I got that degree, I realized I could do this. I could see myself as a teacher.”

She was working in childcare and decided to go back to school for a four-year degree.

Walker earned a bachelor’s degree in early childhood from the University of Alabama at Birmingham and got her teaching certificate in elementary education.

“The first job I got was the school where I went and where my son went ... Vincent Elementary,” she said. “It just blessed my heart to be able to go back there. It had made such a difference to me.”

Walker worked at VES from 1999 to 2005 in different capacities, including classroom teacher, reading recovery teacher and reading interventionist.

In 2003, she started working toward a National Board for Professional Teaching Standards Certification, the most prestigious professional certification in the education field.

“Three of us from Vincent all did it in 2003,” Walker said. “The whole time, I was pregnant with my now 13-year-old, my fourth son in my second

marriage.”

In 2005, Walker applied for a teaching job at Mt Laurel Elementary, the location of which allowed her to take her oldest son to the Alabama School of Fine Arts in Birmingham.

Dr. Bill Naugher, who was principal when Walker was hired, said he knew immediately she would flourish at MLES. “She’s just such a phenomenal person and teacher, and just loved by faculty and staff and students,” Naugher said. “She was just a pleasure to be with every day. She was always in a positive, upbeat mood.”

Walker was voted Teacher of the Year at MLES, an unexpected honor that further cemented her calling as an educator. The same year, she earned her Education Administration Certification from UAB. Naugher left MLES to work for the state department of education, but he followed Walker’s progression from classroom teacher to administrator.

“She had such strong leadership skills and her ability to communicate with others,” Naugher said.

“She is such a motivator.”

Eventually, the assistant principal position at MLES opened. Walker interviewed for it, but wasn’t hired. However, she landed a different position nearby, at Chelsea Elementary, under the leadership of Dr. Lynn Cook until the school split.

When Chelsea Park Elementary formed, Walker became assistant principal under Dr. Jeanette Campisi-Snider’s leadership as principal.

Things came full-circle when the principal Profile 2017

position at MLES became available two years later.

“I applied and got it,” Walker said. “That was my dream. I thought I’d died and gone to heaven.”

Her second stint at MLES lasted for about seven years, during which she earned her doctorate in Early Childhood/Educational Leadership at UAB. She wrote her doctoral dissertation on methods of support for students diagnosed with ADHD, a topic that hit close to home for Walker, not only because of her personal experience with the disorder, but also because of three of her sons receiving the same diagnosis.

Walker was a Virginia Horns-Marsh Doctoral Scholarship recipient.

In 2014, another new opportunity grabbed Walker’s interest. The Shelby County Board of Education’s professional development supervisor position opened up, and Walker thought it would be a good fit for her. She got the job.

As professional development supervisor, Walker is able to “dig into the curriculum” more. Her job entails planning and presenting a state-approved Professional Learning Unit to central office leaders, administrators and lead teachers; facilitates all district professional development for educators and staff; manages the professional development

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budget; supervises the professional development staff and oversees maintenance of the building; and collaborates with school and district leaders to lead and support Key Leaders, New Teacher Orientation and Mentoring, Dyslexia Resources, Continuous School Improvement, Strategic Planning and a multitude of other system-wide initiatives.

“I think my experience as a student, and my experience as a parent of students with different barriers, informs my practice in this position,” Walker said.

Walker said her mission is to help students see past the situation they’re in, to build them up and to remove learning barriers.

CALLED TO SERVE Walker serves on multiple other boards and committees, including Family Connection’s advisory board, Leadership Shelby County board, Teacher Education Committee at the University of Montevallo and the Shelby County Historical Society’s Shelby Sentinels advisory committee.

Walker is “very active” at Vincent First Baptist Church, where she helps with the youth.

She credits her faith with carrying her through

LEFT: Walker speaks to administrators at the Shelby County Instructional Services Center in Alabaster.

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Walker conducts a teacher evaluation at Forest Oaks Elementary School.

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difficult seasons of her life and influencing her decisions and actions professionally.

“God can do something with anybody,” she said.

“God doesn’t see our barriers and then the person.

He sees the person. That has just been my anchor – God’s favor in my job.”

Husband Shannon is one of Walker’s biggest supporters. The two met each other by chance at one of Shannon’s friend’s houses. The unexpected meeting was the beginning of their love story.

They married on April 14, 1993.

Many of Angela’s education and career milestones have happened since then. One that stands out to Shannon is Angela’s doctorate.

“I’m very proud of her for that one,” Shannon said. “I’m very proud of everything she does. She works really well with children; that’s just her natural gift.”

Evidence that Angela chose the appropriate career path for herself is reflected in awards and recognitions she has received over the years: Student of the Year in Early Childhood at UAB, top five finalist for Alabama Teacher of the Year, District III Teacher of the Year, Teacher of the Year for Shelby County, Alabama National Board for Professional Teaching Standards Grant Recipient and Shelby County Education Foundation Grant Recipient.

In addition, she has published chapters in

“Moving Toward Transformation” and “Educational Applications of Child Development,” and has published articles in the “Childhood Education” and “Focus on Teacher Education” journals.

Angela – a loving, caring and perseverant person who accepts challenges and doesn’t back down, according to her husband – has channeled wisdom from overcoming unfortunate circumstances in her life into helping her children, and many others, realize their full potential.

Angela and Shannon have five children, Zack, 26, who with his wife Jessica has a daughter named Madison; Kris, 25, whose wife is Sarah; David, 20; Luke, 18; and Joshua, 13.

Angela loves to exercise and spend time outdoors.

She is toying with the idea of writing a book.

She is convinced her trials were preparation for God’s plans for her adult life. She knows the challenges facing students with learning barriers. The climb up such mountainous obstacles can be rocky and tenuous.

But she also knows the power just one person holds in helping students reach the success awaiting them on the other side of their mountains.

“So many times, we just want to look at the outside and discount people,” she said. “The magic happens when you look past that and see the person.

As educators, that’s what we’re called to do.”  Profile 2017

Against all odds

Smith overcomes adversity to become successful businesswoman

Story by BRIANA HARRIS Photographs by KEITH MCCOY

K

ai Smith’s pleasant demeanor is apparent as soon as you walk through the door at Kai’s Koffee House in Pelham. She spends her workdays tending to her first business, KTL Insurance Services, so it’s a rare treat to see her behind the counter tending to guests.

On the afternoon of Oct. 4, a Hispanic woman, holding her child in her arms, walked into the coffee shop and stopped in the doorway, seeming a bit apprehensive.

“Hi, how are you today? Come on in,” Smith said.

The woman still seemed unsure, so Smith immediately switched gears and asked her in Spanish if she could speak English. When the woman replied no, Smith began talking to the woman in Spanish, putting her at ease.

As a California native, she learned to speak Spanish Profile 2017

at a young age. Smith has a natural way of relating to people. Perhaps it’s because she’s experienced so much herself.

Although she’s been the owner of KTL Insurance Services for 13 years, she’s known by most Pelham residents for the always fresh brewed coffee served at Kai’s Koffee House, which opened three years ago.

Today, Smith is the successful owner two small businesses, but it’s a far cry from where she started.

Smith knows that her success is against what some would consider insurmountable odds.

Smith has been on her own since she was 15. Her Cape Verdean mother decided to move back to her native country, leaving Kai behind to live her stepfather who was a drug addict.

“It started off as a visit and then she just didn’t come back right away,” Smith said. “She said she just wanted to go home. I kind of lived a rough life afterwards.”

Smith lived with her stepfather until he committed suicide, and then she moved around, living with friends

Kai and store manager Stacie Noss chat with Jonathan Hare, a regular customer at Kai’s Koffee.

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KREATING KAI’S KOFFEE Kai Smith was born and raised in Oakland, California, but the journey she took to reach her goals sent her from one part of the country to another.

After graduating high school, Kai moved from California to Montgomery to attend Alabama State University where she received a degree in accounting. After college, she eventually became a Spanish teacher at Jefferson Davis High School in Montgomery.

It was at Jefferson Davis that her coffee business gained roots. She turned her classroom closet into the Coffee Closet – grinding her own coffee and making it available to teachers who could smell the aroma coming from her classroom and would stop by to grab a cup.

After six years as a teacher, she got the opportunity to travel to Honduras with the U.S. Agency for International Development to help coffee farmers digitize their bartering process. After returning from Honduras, Kai was sure that she wanted to open her own coffee shop, so she quit her job as a teacher and began trying to open her own shop.

However, she ran into problems getting a loan from a bank, so she accepted a job offer in Birmingham as an insurance agent. She eventually opened KTL Insurance Services in Pelham and Kai’s Koffee followed years later.

until she graduated high school. At the time, her father was in prison, so living with him wasn’t an option.

“It wasn’t as bad until my stepfather passed,” she said. “When that happened I was like, ‘Oh no, I’m really by myself.’ I was just bouncing around back and forth from people’s houses. At 15 you don’t really know to process all of these things happening to you.”

She understood what it meant to be independent.

At 14, she began working and when her mother left she stepped in to help pay the bills at home.

“I knew what I needed to do to survive and that’s what I did,” she said. “My thought was, ‘How can I keep this going for as long as possible?’ I wasn’t looking for a handout.”

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Smith said nobody really knew what was going on in her life because she made it a point to fly under the radar.

At 17, she found herself facing another challenge when she became pregnant with her oldest daughter.

At that point, the family of her daughter’s father took her in and she worked at K-Mart to support her child.

Attending college was far from her mind.

“I didn’t want to go to college,” she said. “I didn’t Profile 2017

have the grades. I barely got out of high school.”

It was through the Omega Boys Club in San Francisco, California, that she received the opportunity. A middle school teacher by the name of Dr. Joseph Marshall Jr. started the Omega Boys Club in 1987 as a way to help boys and girls realize their potential by attending college.

The promise of stability, shelter, food and clothing is what convinced Smith to take advantage of the organization’s offer. She moved to Montgomery in 1993 to attend college at Alabama State University and the Omega Boys Club paid her tuition, room and board and all of her living expenses.

It was there, in Montgomery, that she would one day meet her future husband. While she was away, her daughter lived with her paternal grandparents.

She received a degree in accounting in 1997. Smith said the nurturing environment she found at Alabama State University helped her make it through.

“I was never a bad kid. I was just a kid who was lost because of their circumstances,” she said.

But a few years later, Smith was dealt another tragic blow.

Her father, with whom she had a close relationship, died of AIDS. “I was the only remaining family on my father’s side, that I knew of at the time, so I had to take control of the burial plans,” she said. “We had no one to come.”

Several years later, she took care of her paternal grandmother having a stroke — Kai Smith and cared for her until she died.

But her experiences dealing with tragedy and heartache would later be perceived as an asset in her career.

“Faith got me

here. I’ve always been a person of faith, even when obstacles seemed too big to overcome.”

FOR THE LOVE OF COFFEE For six years after college, Smith worked as a Spanish teacher at Jefferson Davis High School in Montgomery. It was there that her coffee business gained roots.

She turned her classroom closet into the Coffee Closet – grinding her own coffee and making it available to teachers who could smell the aroma coming from her classroom, and would stop to grab a cup on their way to the front office.

“Teachers would put money in my cup and I guess that was my first little coffee shop,” Smith said.

Culturally, Smith grew up around coffee. Her mother is a native of the West African nation of Cape Verde, where one-third of the country’s population are farmers, with coffee being a popular crop.

In the summer of 2005, she got the opportunity to travel to Honduras with the U.S. Agency for International Development to Profile 2017

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CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: Kai’s Koffee manager Stacie Noss is in charge of day-to-day operations at the shop. An espresso machine pumps out fresh espresso shots. Kai tops off a latte with steamed milk.

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help coffee farmers digitize their bartering process.

“To be honest, I don’t really know how Honduras happened,” she said, laughing. “I think I put my resume online after college and U.S. AID contacted me and told me that my credentials fit the needs of the assignment. I had a degree in accounting and I spoke fluent Spanish, so it just fit.”

This is just another example of how God’s hand has directed her life.

“I spent a month there and when I came back I just had it in my head that I was going to open a coffee shop,” she said. “So I quit my job in November and went off to open my own shop.”

But she ran into a bit of a problem when banks wouldn’t loan her money to start a business.

“I tried for about a month,” she said. “At this time I had two small children and no job so I decided to move to Birmingham to fall back on my accounting degree from ASU.” When she called her life insurance agent to change her address, she also received a job offer.

New England Financial paid for Smith’s schooling and licensing fees. She was told that all the death she’d dealt with at a such a young age enabled her to relate to what

the person on the other side of the phone was going through.

THE POWER OF HAVING FAITH God had a plan for Kai Smith’s life. That’s the only way to explain to how a teenage mother can grow up to become a successful business owner, times two.

“Faith got me here,” she said. “I’ve always been a person of faith, even when obstacles seemed too big to overcome. I don’t have the pretty house with the white picket fence life story, and I know that I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for God.” Ten years into her career with New England Financial – it’s National Coffee Day and someone at a car wash is telling her to try the coffee at a little shop connected to Poppa G’s Billiards on Chandalar Place Drive, but when she got there the shop was out of business.

“So I decided to go into the pool hall to talk to the owner about putting insurance on the business and he shows me this vacant space and says that it would make a great little coffee shop,” she said. “Then he says, ‘Do you know anyone who would be interested in opening a coffee shop?’ I couldn’t even speak, I just raised my hand.”

Two weeks from that day, Kai’s Koffee opened.

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“It was all in order for me. Somebody on Facebook suggested that I go to a coffee shop in Tuscaloosa that was closing to look into purchasing some equipment and that owner sold me everything – coffee makers, furniture, everything.”

All of her previous failures prepared her for this. For three years after college, before becoming a teacher, Smith tried her hand at several different business ventures.

She worked at Regions Bank, started a marketing business, a web design business, a bookkeeping business and a computer repair shop. All of them failed.

But now each of those things she can do for her businesses. Kai’s Koffee has since relocated to 2953 Pelham Parkway and it’s thriving.

Just above the door hangs a cross, and words on the wall read, “Life’s too short to drink cheap coffee,” and “Faith beyond what the eyes can see.” A few tables line a wall while couches provide a cozy spot to sit and read a book, and there’s a more private room where business meetings or private parties can be held.

“Three years is a really big milestone for a small business,” she said. “We have a great following throughout Shelby County.”

The business was voted Shelby Living’s 2016 Best Coffee Shop in Shelby County. It’s coffee the

southern way, Smith says, with hospitality and good conversation. Coffee is shipped in every week to ensure freshness and the food sold there is bought from local restaurants.

Along the way there have been doubters. Some said her coffee shop wouldn’t last because she’s sandwiched between Starbucks, and still, some wait for her to tumble. However, Smith doesn’t let the negativity bother her.

Stacie Noss, manager of Kai’s Koffee, described Kai as a mentor and the type of leader that others want to follow.

“If you do something wrong she doesn’t get upset or scold you, it’s always a teaching moment,” Noss said.

Noss started out working at KTL Insurance but switched over to the coffee shop when Kai was shortstaffed at one point.

Noss said she fell in love with the shop and its cozy environment.

“People say you’re not supposed to work with your friends, but Kai and I were friends first,” Noss said.

“It works for us because we have a common love for the coffee shop and that desire for the coffee shop to be successful allows us to work together in a business sense.”

Bruce Smith, Kai’s husband, said his wife’s success is

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Kai talks business with one of her KTL Insurance employees, Joan Goeb.

a testament to her character.

“It takes a strong person to persevere through certain situations,” he said. “She had a lot against her, but she knew what she deserved and what she wanted in life and she didn’t stop until she got it.”

In the midst of it all, Smith finds time to give back to give back to her community. She volunteered on the Pelhambration board in 2013, started the Pelham Business Alliance and is the chairwoman of Pelham High’s Business Academy.

LOVE AND FAMILY Now a mother of three and married to Bruce Smith, she said she used her businesses to help instill a good work ethic in her children. Her oldest daughter, who is a graduate student studying to become a nurse practitioner at UAB, worked at a coffee shop to earn extra money in college and taught her mother how to make espresso drinks.

Her younger daughter learned the ins and outs of the coffee shop quickly and could open and close the shop on her own at 15. Her youngest child, a son, has yet to show much interest in the coffee business.

But Smith said juggling family life and work can be a bit of a challenge sometimes.

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“Some days are better than others,” she said. “I try to include my kids in the businesses, and I tend to drag them to business events with me so we can spend some time together. I don’t want them to feel like I’m absent in their lives.”

Her husband, a captain in the federal firefighter department at the Maxwell Air Force Base in Montgomery and owner of Birmingham-based Rescue Me Home Inspection, said he and Kai make it a point to be home by 6 p.m. every evening and try not to miss any of their children’s extracurricular activities.

“To keep us grounded in each other, every three months we leave and go somewhere,” Bruce said.

“Sometimes it’s for a weekend and sometimes it’s for a full week – even if we just get in the car and drive and talk until we get tired and then get a hotel somewhere.”

Their trips have included visiting places such as Hawaii, New York, Seattle, Dallas, Houston, Las Vegas, Mexico, and the District of Columbia and the Bahamas.

Above all else, Kai said she and her husband have a strong spiritual connection and belief in God. “As long as we keep God in our marriage and in our lives we can make it through anything – achieve anything,” she said.  Profile 2017

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Living ife to the fullest

Middle-schooler wages courageous cancer battle Story by GRACE THORNTON Photographs by KEITH MCCOY and CONTRIBUTED

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hen Renee Wilder’s little girl showed up in her life in 2003, she hit the family of four like a storm — the best kind of storm,

Wilder said.

Her daughter Mollie “earned the nickname ‘F5’

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from her granddaddy when she started walking at 8 months old,” she said. “He said she was like a little tornado.”

That was a surprise — but they were ready.

What they weren’t ready for was the storm that hit the week before Mollie started the fifth grade.

She was very un-tornado-like that week — lying around on the couch and “just not being her normal bouncy self,” Renee Wilder said. She’d been increasingly complaining of headaches.

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“She’s not a complainer — she’s strong as an ox,” Renee Wilder said of her daughter.

So after a few days of that, a few rounds of painkillers that didn’t help, a few doctor’s visits that deemed it a normal pre-puberty headache, she wasn’t content to wait it out anymore.

It wasn’t long before she and a pediatrician had talked the insurance company into letting Mollie have an MRI. And it was only minutes after that MRI that they were bringing Renee Wilder papers to sign.

Mollie was headed for major surgery.

didn’t like that number.”

That was in 2013.

This fall, Mollie — now an eighth grader — was elected Miss CMS by her peers at Columbiana Middle School.

Her life is a miracle, Renee Wilder said.

When they said Mollie might not live, she did.

When they said she’d probably be profoundly deaf, her hearing has only gotten better, Renee Wilder said.

“She’s had one round of chemo and 30 radiation treatments and six more cycles of chemo,” she said.

“Through it all, she was tough and a fighter.”

‘THROUGH IT ALL, SHE WAS TOUGH’

CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: Renee Wilder with her daughter, Mollie. The Wilder family celebrates Christmas in 2014.

Mollie wears her “beads of courage” with pride.

Each bead represents a procedure or milestone that Mollie went through on her road to recovery.

This bead means Molly is in remission. Mollie is still active, despite her battle with cancer. Mollie Wilder during her first trip to the emergency room in 2013.

COMMUNITY’S SUPPORT “In the first pictures, it clearly indicated she had a pretty severe brain tumor,” Renee Wilder said. “We were told the chances of her surviving the surgery were very slim and that if she did survive, she would probably have lots of complications because the tumor was on her brain stem.”

She might have balance issues, or speech problems, or deafness. The tumor was malignant, too — greater than stage 4.

“Her chances of not surviving were about 90 percent,” Renee Wilder said. “But God decided he Profile 2017

Mollie said she didn’t understand at all what it meant to have cancer or to really be sick before she started the treatments.

“I learned real quick about chemo drugs and radiation treatments and surgery that would make me sicker before I got better,” Mollie said.

But as she fought the cancer, she kept up with her classmates, doing work at home and attending school when she could. Jane Smith, one of her fifth grade teachers at Calera Intermediate School, 35

Mollie Wilder showcases a large ribbon supporting her fight against cancer.

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would meet with her at her house to catch her up.

“I could write a novel about Mollie’s strength, perseverance and attitude,” Smith said.

“She never complained or gave up. She always attended to each task to her fullest.”

And she showed others “what it truly means to live a Christ-filled life,” Smith said.

But Mollie doesn’t see herself as any kind of hero or role model — battling cancer was just something she had to do, she said.

“If I had not gotten up and done anything, it would not have made things better, it would have just gotten worse,” she said.

But her other fifth grade teacher, Allison Hobbs, said her courage was exceptional.

“Mollie was always a fighter, even though she was facing an extremely grim and unexpected battle,” Hobbs said. “She was and is an encouragement and inspiration to anyone who faces battles beyond their control.”

People like Smith, Hobbs and the congregation at the Wilders’ church — Fourmile Baptist in Wilsonville — became pillars to the family during Mollie’s battle with cancer, Renee Wilder said.

“We are grateful for the support,” she said.

“After you go through something like that, you

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don’t have friends anymore — everybody becomes family.”

‘A LIFE-CHANGER’ They had support in the community long before they were in crisis — Scott Wilder, Mollie’s dad, grew up in the Fourmile community, and Renee

“Even when Mollie was in the

hospital, she looked for ways to help others. She never showed her peers her disappointment, fear or anxiety. All we could see was strength.” moved to the area in the eighth grade.

“Scott and I both graduated from Shelby County High School in 1989 and started dating and were married in 1992,” Renee Wilder said. “We were blessed with our first son, Stephen, in July of 1996, our second son was born in May of 2000, and Mollie was our last addition on April 11, 2003.”

They were a typical family, she said. When

— Jane Smith

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ABOVE: Mollie Wilder celebrates receiving her final chemotherapy treatment. TOP RIGHT: Mollie Wilder participating in the Miss Starlet pageant April 2016.BOTTOM RIGHT: Mollie wears her “beads of courage” with pride. Each bead represents a procedure or milestone that Mollie went through on her road to recovery.

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the brain tumor rocked their world, the boys were in the eighth and 12th grades and involved in band, and Mollie was an energetic 10 year old who loved gymnastics, tumbling and jumping on the trampoline.

The tumor “was definitely a life changer,” Renee Wilder said. “We will never be the same, and I don’t want to be. Would I have taken that from her?

Yes. But I have learned so much from her that can never be taken away.”

Mollie’s living life to the fullest these days, raising awareness for childhood cancer, leaning on her faith

and expressing gratitude for the support of her family, church and community.

She said she and her mom have a saying now — “make memories.”

And Smith said Mollie is a leader in the way she lives.

“Even when Mollie was in the hospital, she looked for ways to help others. She never showed her peers her disappointment, fear or anxiety.

All we could see was strength,” Smith said.

For more about Mollie’s story, visit her Facebook page, Prayers4Mollie.  Profile 2017

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‘He is living history’

Johnson lives through hardships to become symbol of Pelham

Story by NEAL WAGNER Photographs by KEITH MCCOY and CONTRIBUTED CLOCKWISE FROM ABOVE: Mosely Johnson with his wife, Linda.

Mosely Johnson looks at the glass wall that used to separate the segregated bus waiting areas at the Birmingham Greyhound bus station.

Johnson received several commemorative awards from his time at Greyhound.

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S

eventy-seven-year-old Mosely Johnson still vividly remembers one of the scariest experiences of his life.

Driving through his hometown of Warrior one night during the Civil Rights era, Johnson, who is black, accidentally rolled up on a Ku Klux Klan rally blocking the roadway downtown.

Unable to turn his car around, Johnson had no choice but to slowly pull forward into the sea of people clad in white hoods and robes.

“They parted, and I pulled on up. I thought

‘Mosely, this is it. You may not make it through this,’” Johnson said as he leaned forward, placed his elbows on the restaurant table and spoke somberly, his eyes wide behind his dark brown-framed glasses nearly half a century later. “A guy with a hood on leaned into my car and looked at me, and I just sat there frozen.

“Then, he said ‘He’s OK. Let him go,’” Johnson said. “Evidently someone in that crowd knew me. I was shaking like a leaf on a tree as the crowd parted and I drove on through.”

Even so, the experience did not change Johnson’s feelings about his Jefferson County hometown.

There’s a good chance some of the people dressed in white for the rally were his childhood friends Profile 2017

from what Johnson recalled as a relatively integrated upbringing.

“Warrior was a small town, and everyone knew everybody, white and black. Oddly enough, we didn’t have any racial problems growing up,” said Johnson, who was born in 1939. “In our neighborhood, white people and black people all lived next to each other, and everything was fine.”

Johnson’s parents would often share a few simple pieces of advice with him and his siblings, and it has followed him throughout his life.

“My parents would tell us to not be loud, because black people can be loud,” Johnson said with a muffled chuckle. “Even today, people will tell me to speak up because I talk so soft.

“They also told us to stay clean and to be prepared, because one day an opportunity will come along, and you need to be prepared for it,” he continued. “They taught us to respect everybody.”

At the time, racial strife was in full swing in the South, especially in Birmingham. Johnson experienced this firsthand as an employee at the Greyhound bus station downtown, where he started working at the age of 17 in 1957.

FRONT LINES OF CHANGE On Johnson’s first day on the job at the Greyhound station, he set a goal for himself and began living by a creed to make the goal a reality. Although his job was a textbook example of Profile 2017

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1 6 9 1 , n Annisto

Jackson,

humble beginnings, he took pride in every aspect of it.

“I started out cleaning bathrooms with a toothbrush,” Johnson said, a gold-and-diamond ring emblazoned with the Greyhound logo he received on his 35th anniversary with the company shining on his finger. “I told myself, ‘If you do a good job, they will notice you.’ I always tried to do the best job I could at whatever I was doing. It took them 22 years, but they did notice me.”

After more than two decades with the company, Johnson was promoted to a supervisor role at the station. At the time, some of the people Johnson had working under him were surprised he knew so much about the station’s operations.

“They would say ‘He hasn’t been here during the night shift, how does he know what we do?’ While people slept on their breaks, I was reading books on how to be a good manager,” Johnson said. “We had people all the time say that was the cleanest Greyhound station they had ever been in.”

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Working of the at one main transportation hubs in Birmingham during the

Miss., 19 61

Civil Rights era, Johnson was frontand-center for one of the roughest periods in the nation’s history.

When the first Freedom Riders began arriving in the city, their first stop often was at the bus station.

“When the first Civil Rights riders came to Birmingham, I was working that day,” Johnson said. “I saw people with chains, bats and sticks start lining up at the station. Some of the drivers covered up the windshields on the buses, and those people would go in the buses and beat the riders for 15 minutes before the police showed up.”

One night, Johnson was on his way to work after attending church in Birmingham’s Lewisburg neighborhood when he had a run-in with one of the city’s police officers.

“I decided to take a shortcut to work that night instead of taking my normal route, and I drove up on a police officer standing with his foot up on his car, smoking a cigar and holding a shotgun,” Johnson said. “He asked where I was going, and I told him I was heading to work from church.

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“He searched my trunk, and I had a songbook, a Bible and a briefcase,” Johnson added.

“He waved me through and said ‘Just don’t try to go to any of the white folks’ schools.’”

As the years went on, Johnson began seeing some changes in the city mirroring progress across the nation. Suddenly, something began happening Johnson said he never anticipated.

“I’ll be honest with you, I never thought the country would be integrated. I just didn’t think it would happen,” Johnson said. “It was a tough time, but my parents taught me to be polite to police, and that’s what I did.”

In 2001, Johnson saw his Civil Rights experience come full circle, as he had a chance to meet Georgia Congressman John Lewis during a Freedom Riders memorial event in Birmingham.

FAMILY SUPPORT Johnson did not face the hardships of the Civil Rights era alone. Two years after he started working at the Greyhound station, he married his

high school sweetheart, Ellen Beatrice Hamilton.

The couple settled down in their hometown of Warrior, and enjoyed a quiet life together for nearly three decades.

But in 1980, Ellen received some devastating news. At the age of 40, the family learned she had terminal breast cancer.

“I’ve always been concerned about

the community I live in, and I always try to give back in some way.”

“It took her seven years to die. That was the worst thing I have ever been through,” Johnson said quietly. “She died in 1987 at just 47 years old.

“She was a very brave woman. She never said ‘Why me?’” Johnson said. “But it was devastating to see that happen. You can’t do anything to help.”

After his first wife died, the memories in the couple’s hometown eventually became too much to bear.

“I just couldn’t stand to live there anymore, so I got an apartment in Birmingham,” he said.

The first weekend he was living in his new

— Mosely Johnson

1

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TOP: Mosely Johnson and his wife, Linda, look through a scrapbook from Johnson’s time at Greyhound. ABOVE: Mosely Johnson at his desk at the Birmingham Greyhound bus station.

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apartment, Johnson’s sisterin-law introduced him to his current wife, Linda, who was working at AT&T at the time.

Their families arranged a date for the two, which eventually sparked a marriage still going strong today.

“I arrived (to the date) early, and she did too,” Johnson said with a laugh. “My brother and his

Jackson, M iss., 1961 wife, who had arranged the date, got there late and introduced us, but we had already met.”

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A NEW HOME Linda was already living in Pelham, and Johnson joined his new bride in Shelby County in the late 1980s.

Almost from the first day he moved to Pelham’s Chandalar neighborhood, Johnson became involved in the community. His old friend Bobby Hayes, a former Birmingham police officer who regularly helped Johnson at the Greyhound station, was Pelham’s mayor at the time, and appointed Johnson

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to the city’s Beautification Board.

“I’ve always been concerned about the community I live in, and I always try to give back in some way,” Johnson said.

During his time with the Beautification Board, Johnson has been instrumental in recognizing homes and businesses of the month, planning and growing the city’s annual Christmas tree lighting ceremony and organizing the city’s now-annual Pelham Palooza celebration.

He’s also been instrumental in shaping the city’s politics – A subject he has always been informed

LEFT: A wall in Johnson’s house honors his time spent working at Greyhound. RIGHT: Mosely Johnson, right, worked at the downtown Birmingham Greyhound station for several decades, including the city’s tumultuous civil rights era.

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1 6 9 1 , . s s i M , n o Jacks RIGHT: Johnson participated in the 40th anniversary of the Freedom Rides in Birmingham in 2001.

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on.

“It’s so easy to research each candidate and get to know them before you vote. With the Internet, there’s no excuse for not having all the information in the world,” said Johnson, who at 77 years old is active on Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Nextdoor and is known to reply to most emails the same day they were sent.

One of the people he was instrumental in electing was current Pelham City Councilman Maurice Mercer, who was elected in 2012. But it took Johnson a while to research Mercer before he threw his support behind him.

“I ran in 2008, and he actually didn’t support me that year,” Mercer said with a laugh. “But I’d much rather him tell me that directly. I respected that.”

After Mercer’s unsuccessful 2008 council bid, Johnson recommended Mercer for the Beautification Board, where the two became friends. When Mercer ran again for council in 2012, he had Johnson’s full support and earned more than 76 percent of the votes in a runoff against fellow

candidate Jim Phillips.

Over the past several years, Johnson has become somewhat of a father figure to Mercer, who lost his mother and grandfather within a two-year span beginning in 2011.

“Those were two people I really looked to for advice, and Mosely kind of stepped in and filled that role,” Mercer said.

He has also been a mentor figure for Pelham City Schools’ Director of Operations Floyd Collins, especially on matters of transportation.

“He provides a lot of insight. It’s good to have knowledgeable people who have been in your position before to provide that kind of insight,” Collins said. “I really appreciate him always being there.”

When it came time for the city school system to begin ordering new buses, Johnson was a strong advocate for air conditioned buses – A decision Collins said will have many benefits for the school system moving forward.

“A lot of people will say ‘If you need anything, give me a call,’” Collins said. “When Mosely says that, he means every word of it.”

Today, Johnson displays few signs of the hardships he has overcome during his time on earth.

“Just to have made it through what he went through, I think we owe him a debt of respect.

He is living history,” Mercer said. “Going through something like that could make you bitter, but he stayed grounded and he continues to see the good in people.

“He doesn’t meet any strangers or enemies,” Mercer added.  Profile 2017

BUILDING COMMUNITY TOGETHER

SINCE 1967

Hoover attractions are known to bring

CELEBRATING

life. Citizens and visitors enjoy various events hosted by our beautiful city throughout the year,

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many of which raise money for philanthropic

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thousands of people together from all walks of

endeavors. These celebrations highlight

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A

everything that makes our community great. As

ALABA

YEARS

we look back at our history as a city, we know that our future will continue to be bright.

hooveralabama.gov

A labor of love

Barefields head support of National Cemetery Story by GRACE THORNTON Photographs by KEITH MCCOY

B

RIGHT: Bob Barefield kneels beside one of the thousands of headstones in the Alabama National Cemetery in Montevallo.

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ob Barefield has set foot in a lot of places over his 30 years of active duty.

He can rattle off numbers of Ranger battalions and airborne units and list locations he’s served in from Panama to Cambodia.

But there’s another set of numbers, another strip of land that has the heart of Bob Barefield these days.

It’s the 479 quiet, grassy acres in Montevallo that are serving as the final resting place for thousands of veterans. Since the moment he set foot on it, he’s felt like it was hallowed ground.

In the sprawling Alabama National Cemetery, white headstones dot the green hills, and flags flap in the quiet breeze. The sound of taps drifts out over the grounds from the eight or nine internment services held there every day.

And from the moment a hearse enters the front gates of the cemetery, every cost is taken care of for veterans, their spouses and dependent children.

“There are so many veterans and families who don’t know that they can be buried in a national shrine like this for free,” Bob Barefield said of the grounds, which opened in 2009 and are being built

out to hold a projected 200,000 burials.

It’s an option veterans need to know about, he said.

That’s why he and his wife, Nancy, spend many of their days on the road, educating people around the state about their “real heroes” and the place where they can be laid to rest.

And that’s why he’s in his ninth year of serving on a volunteer basis as chairman of the Support Committee for the cemetery, an office he’s held since the committee was formed.

“It’s just a labor of love, that’s what it is,” Bob Barefield said.

A MAJOR DEVELOPMENT The committee’s formation was quick on the heels of Montevallo being designated as the site for the new cemetery.

“There are only two other national cemeteries in Alabama,” he said. “There’s one in Mobile, but it’s full. And there’s one at Fort Mitchell over near Auburn that was built in the 1980s.”

The one in Montevallo was going to be the only one in central or north Alabama, and it was going to be big. And it was going to need support.

So the 150-member committee was formed with Profile 2017

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CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: Eagle Scout Wolfe Anderson, center, works on assembling chair racks for the Alabama National Cemetery. Marshall Goggins, left, a volunteer at the Alabama National Cemetery shakes hands with Bob Barefield. The Alabama National Cemetery Support Committee helps to care for all areas of the venue. Wreaths line the headstones following the “Wreaths across America” program.

Bob Barefield at the helm, and they came alongside cemetery staff in what Quincy Whitehead, director of the Alabama National Cemetery, calls a “great partnership.”

“They’ve helped us get to know the people we need to know and the resources we need to have to keep the cemetery running,” she said. “It’s also been a great way to get veterans involved in the cemetery as well.”

“The people we meet

and the stories we hear — they cry, we cry. I’ll have tears running down my face, and so will Bob. Words can’t describe it.”

COMMITTEE’S SUPPORT In addition to educating the state about the benefits of the cemetery, the Barefields and the 50

support committee invest in the cemetery in tangible ways all the way from purchasing flagpoles for the Avenue of Flags to providing chairs, ice and drinks at memorial services.

They also raise money for special causes like the Wreaths Across America program, which provides holiday wreaths for every veteran’s grave, whether buried in a national cemetery or not. They also make arrangements for Memorial Day flag ceremonies, from — Nancy Barefield planning the service all the way to poking holes in the hard ground at each grave in preparation for the flags to be placed.

That may seem small, but it’s a huge comfort to Profile 2017

I am becoming... a part of College Night a campus tour guide

an educator Marcus Moore elementary education major Irondale, Alabama

What will you become? www.montevallo.edu | (205) 665-6030 admissions@montevallo.edu | #futurevallo

people like Adrienne Bourland, whose son Ken is buried in the Alabama National Cemetery.

“Ken’s boys, Charley and Andrew, enjoy being able to go to the cemetery and put the flag on Ken’s grave at Memorial Day and the wreath in December for Wreaths Across America,” she said.

Ken Bourland was killed in the 2010 earthquake in Haiti and was the first person killed in active duty to be buried there, she said. “The cemetery hadn’t been open for very long at that point.”

But she remembers a couple of years before when she and Ken stood on the hill at the American Village during the Fourth of July celebration and looked out over the land that had just been earmarked for the not-yet-built cemetery.

“We looked in that direction, and I remember him saying that it would be a good place to be buried,” Bourland said.

THE WILL TO HELP It’s for people like Ken Bourland that the Barefields keep going. It’s for people like Mitchell Spears, a veteran and longtime Profile 2017

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Bob and his wife Nancy stand on the ground of the future location of the scenic overlook.

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family, friends, community member of the support HOW TO GET INVOLVED and nation.” committee, who joined And it will give visitors a Ken Bourland there Oct. The Alabama National Cemetery Support private moment to reflect 17 after passing away at Committee is a 501 (c) (3) public charity and commune with nature, home five days before. volunteer organization providing services to she said.

“We will forever be facilitate the enhancement, maintenance and “The cemetery is built grateful for Mitchell’s legal expansion of the Alabama National Cemetery in for people to find solace,” guidance and counsel for Montevallo.

Nancy Barefield said. the support committee, The Support Committee is involved in several Adrienne Bourland and we will miss him,” Bob special programs at the cemetery each year, agreed.

Barefield said. including Memorial Day, Keep the Spirit of 45 “We’ve had the But it’s for their families Alive and Wreaths Across America.

To become involved in the National Cemetery opportunity to make new and the thousands like Support Committee, visit Scalnc.org and friends, some of which them that the Barefields fill out a membership application under the have stories similar to that and the rest of the support “Membership dues” section. of our family,” she said. committee are raising Dues for individual membership are $25 per The Barefields say it’s funds to build the Shoal year, and dues for organizational membership for those moments, those Creek Overlook, an are $100 per year. people that they keep at outdoor sanctuary for the their work day after day. loved ones of veterans to “The people we meet and the stories we hear reflect on the lives of the ones they lost, he said.

— they cry, we cry. I’ll have tears running down The overlook, which will sit 40 feet above my face, and so will Bob. Words can’t describe it,” a horseshoe bend in the creek, will be down a Nancy Barefield said. wheelchair-accessible path that starts behind the For more information about Wreaths Across columbarium.

America, visit Bluestarsalute.org/wreaths-across“The overlook will be a 28-foot diameter circle with a gold star in the middle,” said Nancy Barefield, america.html.

For more information about the Support who is serving as fundraising chairman for the Committee for the Alabama National Cemetery or project. “There will be ripples emanating from the to find out how to get involved, visit Scalnc.org. star that will reflect that person’s impact on their Profile 2017

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Saved from sin

After bad decisions, Aaron Knight gains redemption Story by ALEC ETHEREDGE Photographs by KEITH MCCOY

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Knight stands in the woods where he lived homeless for so long. A quarter of a mile walk behind him will take you to the old car he used to sleep in.

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aron Knight was recently named the pastor at Redemption Church in Chelsea, an opportunity that excited him, but the path to how he got there is a long, dark and disturbing roller coaster that most of us wouldn’t make it through alive.

His story starts during his late teens when he decided to run away from home for the second time, at which point his dad told him not to come back.

He lived off and on with friends until their families got tired of him and threw him back to the wild. This would go on for about a year and a half before he reached his lowest point at 18-years-old.

“It was really my lowest point for two reasons, I lived in 25 places over those two years and you eventually wear out your welcome, so I found myself in a situation where I didn’t have a place to live at all anymore,” Knight said.

This is when Knight found himself living in the woods off of Bradley Drive inside of a Plymouth Reliant K. “I’m not the tallest fella, but there’s not a whole lot of room in the back of one of those things,” he said. “I would go days at a time without bathing or eating.”

Next to having no home, Knight found himself on the wrong side of the law being arrested seven times throughout his juvenile and early adult life.

In 1990 he spray-painted what he said was pretty Profile 2017

much everything in the city of Chelsea, including the Old Weldon Store, the rock outside of Highland Lakes and the press box at the football stadium. He also went to jail for shoplifting a pair of jeans from McRae’s in the Galleria.

In 1991 he left Chelsea on first degree kidnapping charges when he took a girl over state lines without parental consent. Knight, 18, and her, 15, planned to run away with each other, but neither was aware of the repercussions. The charges ended up being dropped later on.

“We laugh about it now when I see her, but her picture was all over town here for a while and everybody knew she and I were hanging out, so people started thinking I had done something to her,” Knight said.

He was also arrested in Leeds at one point when he and a buddy decided to play chicken with a cop by attempting to run him off the road. Even worse, they were on their way to pick up cocaine in Auburn when it happened, which leads us into Knight’s dark days of drug abuse.

“I used everything but heroin because I was terrified of needles,” Knight said. “Crack cocaine, pills, marijuana, crystal meth when it first came out, ecstasy and there’s no telling what else. There were times we mixed up some stuff that was really-really bad.”

Knight’s onset to his drug obsession began by driving his friends to pick up cocaine or other drugs before he eventually got the urge to try it, which hooked him immediately.

“Next thing you know I was strung out on all of these different drugs and living in the woods,” he said.

The drugs made Knight desperate for money so he could afford to support his addiction and in 1991, there was an excessive amount of copper wire theft in Chelsea, something Knight was responsible for.

“My friend Eric and I were stealing copper from all over Chelsea,” Knight said. “We knew where all of the electricians and plumbers that dealt with copper lived, so we would go out during the day while people were at work and steal everything we could steal.”

Knight was also in the weed business, selling dope for 10 years until the age of 30, and it wasn’t until one day in 2003, on 19th Street in Bessemer in front

of the Pipe Shop where he sold weed that he finally got a wake-up call.

“It was a man named Charles Diffee that changed my life forever,” he said.

On that day in 2003 at 5:30 a.m., Diffee pulled out in front of him causing Knight to hit him with his Nissan Altima.

“I got out of my car to see if he was okay, but here is where it gets crazy, he didn’t even ask me if I was OK,” Knight said. “Instead he got out and handed me a handwritten letter and said, ‘God wants you to have this.’ It was crazy, almost like God had him do that to turn my life around.”

The letter that 80-year-old man handed Knight was already written out before the accident occurred and talked about how much time he had spent wasting in life running away from God. To this day Knight still has the letter at his dad’s house.

“I would’ve believed he was an angel had he not seen me giving that testimony a month later,” he

“I remember driving by this church strung out on

cocaine with copper wire in the back of the truck, and now 25 years later, God has brought me full circle back to this same area to not only give me redemption, but give me the opportunity to help other people have a chance at redemption as well.”

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said.

He ended up going to Church of the Highlands in his late 30s, which he actually didn’t like at the time, saying he only went there because he wanted to go to a big church so not many people would know he was a new member and ask why he was there.

He ended up getting involved in Highlands Haven and prison ministry with the church and enjoyed the impact he was having.

It also led him to running into Kellie Wigley on Friday the 13th at a bar.

“That was the time period I was still somewhat running from the Lord, but God started putting pieces of my life back together and she was one of them,” Knight said. “We were in a bar drinking with friends and at one point I set my drink down and just started talking to her. We ended up talking for two and a half hours about nothing but God.” Knight mentioned that Wigley “stirred” something up inside of him that he thought was “dead and dormant.”

— Aaron Knight

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Knight gives a sermon to the many people who have helped him grow K Springs Redemption Church into what it is today.

“She told me I was going to preach someday and I that was at the time. I had just gotten married, I had been homeless, I dealt and was taking drugs told her ‘You are crazy, if only you knew how much for almost a quarter of my life, I went through a stuff I have messed up in my life you would not be marriage the wheels fell off of; I just thought to saying that,’” he said. “I thought there was no way God would trust me with a church after everything I myself ‘Why on earth would they do this,’” Knight said. did wrong.”

His first official day to give a sermon was March On Oct. 25, 2015, the two got married, which 27, 2016, better known as Easter Sunday. led Knight to chase after his newfound dream of “I believe God is intentional with becoming a preacher. certain things like numbers,” Knight He started his adventure with said.

Church of the Highlands at Highlands When he first started in March the College at the age of 40. Knight felt church had 43 members, a number that he went unnoticed and flew under that has grown to reach around 150 the radar throughout his time in the The church started with 43 members and has members today. program. already grown to more A quarter of a mile walk through the “I was never asked to participate than 150 members since woods behind Redemption Church lies in small groups or really do anything he took over.

Bradley Drive and the area where he special like that while I was there,” slept in that old Plymouth Reliant K. Knight said.

“It all happened right here,” Knight said. “I March 20, 2016, Knight was given that remember driving by this church strung out on opportunity when he was voted to become the cocaine with copper wire in the back of the truck, pastor of Redemption Church at K Springs in and now 25 years later, God has brought me full Chelsea, a vote that passed making Knight the only graduate of Highlands College who is a senior pastor circle back to this same area to not only give me redemption, but give me the opportunity to help in the metro area. other people have a chance at redemption as well.”  “I couldn’t help but think how unreal and dumb

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Getting a second chance Blackwell conquers drug addiction to become pharmacist Story by GRAHAM BROOKS Photographs by KEITH MCCOY

I ABOVE: Angela Blackwell currently works at the CVS Pharmacy in Southside.

RIGHT: Angela Blackwell with her twin sister Amber Curlette. Amber played a pivotal role in providing positive support for her sister every step of the way.

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f Helena resident Angela Blackwell were to pass by you on the sidewalk in Old Town Helena, you would never guess that Blackwell spent years of her life fighting drug addiction that at one point caused her to live in a pickup truck at a variety of places in downtown Birmingham in her 20s.

Blackwell, now 38, has hit the highest of highs and the lowest of lows so far in her life and she isn’t afraid to talk about her past and how far she’s come.

In 2016, Blackwell can be seen wearing a white pharmacist lab coat, and Nov. 5, 2016 marked her 11th year of being completely clean.

In that timeframe Blackwell has a story to tell and emphasized that it wasn’t easy to get to where she is now.

WHERE THE HABITS FORMED In 2000, Blackwell moved from Sarasota, Florida, to attend Samford University in Birmingham.

Blackwell did well in school and in 2004 graduated with a Doctor of Pharmacy degree from the prestigious McWhorter School of Pharmacy.

Most people who have a PharmD would admit that they worked extremely hard and the classes required to earn the degree are challenging.

Blackwell passed all the required classes and earned every credit hour, but the only difference is that Blackwell did all of this while also being high on Profile 2017

illicit drugs.

While at Samford, Blackwell began a romantic relationship and admitted that her boyfriend Johnny lived a much different lifestyle than Blackwell did at the time.

“Johnny was a construction worker and he just lived a fly-by-the-seat lifestyle,” said Blackwell. “I wasn’t exposed to that because my dad was really strict and it was my first time away from home so I basically said ‘whatever he’s doing I want to do.’ So it started with using whenever we’d go out to a party or on the weekend with Oxycontin and back then it was formulated to where you could snort it to get high. We started hanging out more and more using illicit drugs and other things started to come into play such as ecstasy, marijuana and I had never even smoked a cigarette before this, so this was a whole new ballgame for me.”

Shortly after Blackwell met her boyfriend, her father passed away and Blackwell took his death really hard and admitted to using drugs as an outlet for stress and said it progressed her drug use.

Upon graduation, Blackwell began working at Walgreens Pharmacy, and while she seemed like she had her life Profile 2017

together, Blackwell’s drug addiction became more severe and the amount of drugs needed to feel normal increased.

“It was every day, three or four times a day,” said Blackwell. “I would take out student loans just to pay for the drugs. I would get a $5,000 loan here and there just to be able to pay for that.”

A DOWNWARD SPIRAL Shortly after graduation and starting her pharmacy career working at Walgreens, Blackwell could not pry herself from the grip of addiction, which resulted in Blackwell using her job to continue to feed her needs.

“I was calling in fake prescriptions and would call in a lortab prescription under a fake person’s name and then I would have Johnny come pick it up,” said Blackwell.

“I would call it in before I got to the store, retrieve the voicemail myself and put it in the system.”

As sneaky and discrete as Blackwell tried to be, she was eventually caught and said, “to this day, I still don’t know how I was caught.”

When the police and pharmacy board came into the store to investigate, Blackwell said she “had a sick feeling in 61

Blackwell showcases her pharmacy license.

her stomach,” and after searching the computer for a long time the police and pharmacy board had the evidence they needed and knew Blackwell had a problem.

Johnny, now Blackwell’s husband, was discovered as the one who helped Blackwell feed her addiction.

More than enough evidence was found in Johnny’s pickup truck that included other prescriptions and surveillance video of a matching license plate number when he would come pick up fake orders called in by Blackwell.

Blackwell and Johnny were charged and sent to jail as a result of calling in fake prescriptions, but even after getting caught, the pair had no intentions of stopping their drug use.

THE LOW POINT After being arrested, Blackwell and Johnny continued to use illicit drugs, so much so that

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they stopped paying rent on the house they were living in and Blackwell’s new Honda Accord was repossessed after payments were not made.

“All at the same time, we were evicted from our home, my car got towed and we were living in his (Johnny’s) truck which is the only thing we had that was paid for,” said Blackwell. “Every week for three or four days we would pay for a shower at the truck stop and I just remember in that state of mind thinking, ‘wow this is great, I get to get a shower’ but it never crossed my mind that I’m paying to take a shower at a truck stop.”

At this point, Blackwell and Johnny were taking drugs such as Dilaudid, methadone and Oxycontin and were now injecting the drugs as opposed to snorting to get a greater high.

Blackwell and Johnny were homeless but still needed to fund an addiction. The two brainstormed on ways to find cash and a resolution was found.

“We would go to newly built houses and steal appliances out of them,” said Blackwell. “That’s Profile 2017

how we were funding our habit and it was a $600 a day habit.

We were spending so much money on drugs that we didn’t even have enough money for a motel room.”

At the same time Blackwell was fighting her addiction, her daughter Charleigh was born on Nov. 1, 2005. Blackwell said that the first year after Charleigh was born, the couple spent it on the run, which included living in the truck and taking Charleigh to various relatives’ homes and places where they knew she’d be cared for while Blackwell dealt with her addiction.

“We were hustling every day doing illegal drugs, stealing stuff and selling it every single day,” said Blackwell. “The construction workers at these places with newly developed homes began to realize that they were missing stuff and would file reports. They all began to realize that it was a white truck and one guy tried to chase us on a high speed chase and we eventually got away and found a garage to hide in– it was crazy.”

Finally, after a year of stealing and reselling various items for drug money, the lies and theft finally caught up to Blackwell and Johnny.

The couple went to a subdivision near Ballantrae and a contractor spotted the couple’s white truck and followed them out while calling the police.

The end result was that the police finally cornered the couple and — Angela Blackwell it was time for Blackwell to face consequences for her actions.

“I had a failure to appear for court in Jefferson County because I was doing other things like getting high so I had a warrant out for my arrest,” said Blackwell.

In the end, Blackwell faced 13 felony charges including several unlawful distribution charges and receiving stolen property and also faced one misdemeanor charge.

& More!

“I have fun, I

have money to buy stuff, to go to a movie, eat nice food and to me that means so much more than $500 on dope per day and having nothing to show for it. Being an addict sucks. All addicts do is they think about having a normal life.”

FACING THE CONSEQUENCES Immediately following her arrest in 2006, Blackwell faced an uphill climb if she wanted to get her life back.

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CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: This is the house in southside Birmingham where Angela lived while she used drugs before she was put in jail. This is Angela’s current home in Helena. Family photos fill Blackwell’s house.

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Blackwell was sent to jail for a week to sober up immediately after being arrested and was given an opportunity to go to drug court in Shelby County, which was under the direction of Circuit Court Judge Michael Joiner at the time, to which Blackwell said, “absolutely, yes I want to do it.”

Once it was time to enter the program, Blackwell did not take it seriously and once she was let back out into the real world, Blackwell did not show up for a court date, instead electing to get high.

“It only took three weeks for them to find me and bring me back to court,” said Blackwell. “Judge Joiner said ‘I really don’t know what to do with you.

I’m really thinking prison might be the best place.’

When he said that, he left me in jail for four weeks and then he was finally ready to talk to me again.”

Joiner asked Blackwell if she wanted to continue to be in prison and Blackwell said no and agreed that she needed to get help.

Blackwell spent the following months in and out of work release, various rehab facilities and received several drug tests along the way.

After six months of being clean, Blackwell went

back to the Shelby County Drug Court with the intention of taking it seriously this time.

THE ROAD TO RECOVERY After continuing to progress through the drug program and passing several drug tests and attending all the required meetings, Blackwell decided to contact the pharmacy board to see what she needed to do to get her license back.

Blackwell was put in contact with Steve Moore, then a member of the pharmacy board.

Moore told Blackwell that she needed to sign up for drug testing through the pharmacy board, get the felony charges removed, which meant completing the drug court program in Shelby and Jefferson counties because charges occurred in both counties, complete theft of property court in Jefferson and Shelby counties and if she did all of these things, she could then be reconsidered to get her license back.

Blackwell accomplished all of these things while also holding a job and being drug tested for three Profile 2017

separate programs.

“All in all, I completed all of those programs and went in front of the pharmacy board,” said Blackwell. “June 2010 is when I got my license back. Two years after I graduated from Samford was spent wreaking havoc and then the other four years were spent placing the pieces all back together. During this time I also divorced Johnny, which was a really big decision and a scary one because I was a single mom at that point, but I had to make big changes.”

LIFE AFTER GETTING CLEAN Soon after getting her license back, Blackwell began looking for a job and in 2010 CVS Pharmacy gave her a second chance.

“They gave me a second chance, which I’m very grateful for it,” said Blackwell. “I started working for them right away. I told them that I was going to prove to them that I can do this job really well.”

After floating to different stores for a few months, Blackwell was promoted to store manager at the CVS Pharmacy in Irondale where she worked for two years.

After that, Blackwell worked for CVS Pharmacy

in Hoover and is currently working at CVS as a staff pharmacist in Southside, just minutes away from where she used to shoot up drugs a few years prior.

“It’s fun being sober and it’s not like I’m a nerd,” Blackwell said referring to being sober for 11 years.

“I have fun, I have money to buy stuff, to go to a movie, eat nice food and to me that means so much more than $500 on dope per day and having nothing to show for it. Being an addict sucks. All addicts do is they think about having a normal life.”

The past three years, Blackwell has lived in Helena where she is raising her 11-year-old daughter and lives near her sister, who also lives in Helena.

“My sister had a lot to do with me getting clean, She was here with me and she was really strict on me,” said Blackwell. “When I was making progress in drug court, she would let me live with her and her husband in Southside.”

Blackwell said her sister and husband would record the miles on Blackwell’s car and map out exactly where she should be going so she would not try to sneak around to find drugs.

“Drugs don’t affect just the addict, but it affects everybody involved,” said Blackwell. “Family

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Nov. 5, 2016 marked Blackwell’s 11th year of being completely clean.

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members may get stressed and start using or spend all their money trying to get them sober.”

In 2016, in addition to being a pharmacist, Blackwell also spends her time speaking about her story and is an advocate for a variety of programs aimed at helping addicts get their lives back on track or preventing drug abuse.

“The three main areas of focus in my life are the Washington Legislative Affairs to improve funding for people like us and veterans who come back from war and have PTSD, COMPACT 2020 and CVS One Choice,” said Blackwell. “Shelby County has one of the best drug courts in the state. Judge Joiner started a really good program and it’s very strict. If you’re late, you’re sanctioned for jail or community service and there’s no nonsense. A lot

of counties are trying to replicate that program. My affiliation with the National Association of Drug Court Professionals is to promote more funding for these programs because it saved me and I want to give back to the community.”

Beyond 2016, Blackwell still wants to be a pharmacist but she wants to continue to make an impact by sharing her story.

“I still want to be a pharmacist, but I feel like the most good I could do is giving my testimony,” said Blackwell. “I find the most enjoyment in doing what I’m doing when it’s dealing with recovery.

My story just goes to show you that it doesn’t matter who you are or how much willpower you have or how smart you are, drugs can affect anybody.”  Profile 2017

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Building a miracle Community comes together as man beats terminal diagnosis

Story by NEAL WAGNER Photographs by KEITH MCCOY

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ick Vanderslice wasn’t supposed to see this day.

As he sits on an aged, wooden rocking chair on the front porch of his home opposite his wife, Yvonne, on a crisp, sunny morning in November, Vanderslice is remarkably lively for a man who, only a year ago, was expected to live just a few months.

“I just thank God above,” Rick said as he sat calmly in his chair, the weariness from a nearly yearlong battle with cancer evident in his eyes just beneath the brim of his bright orange Auburn University baseball cap. “He has moved so many mountains for me.”

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About 50 yards from where Rick is sitting, a small stone staircase fortified by cinderblocks is the only remainder of a house filled with a combination of happy memories and hardship. While it was a blessing for his family when they moved into the house off Old Highway 31 in the 1960s, time took its toll on the structure, and caused it to become dangerously unstable, leaky and nearly uninhabitable.

Today, the old home is just a memory, and in its place stands a monument to the love and compassion a group of friends and strangers showed a family in its greatest hour of need. And through the community’s help, Rick has overcome what doctors originally said was an almost certain death sentence.

He doesn’t hesitate to call his current situation a “miracle from God.”

Yvonne and Rick Vanderslice relax on the front porch of their newly built home in Alabaster.

“We’re out here all the time,” Yvonne says.

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DEVASTATING NEWS The family still vividly remembers the day in October 2015 Rick’s physician at a local no-cost health clinic delivered the news.

Rick had not been feeling well for several weeks, but the family’s financial situation at the time did not allow them to pay for a doctor’s visit. As a longtime construction worker, Rick had fallen on hard times as the area’s building market was still struggling to recover from years of economic decline.

After learning about the free health clinic, Rick scheduled a visit to determine the cause of his illness.

After running a few tests, the doctors at the clinic immediately admitted Rick to Shelby Baptist Medical Center in Alabaster, where doctors performed a biopsy on a Wednesday.

By Friday of the same week, physicians confirmed the worst.

“It was called incurable cancer because it was spread all through his body. It wasn’t just in one spot,” Yvonne said softly. “I asked the doctor, and he just said ‘It’s ugly.’”

A team of nurses accompanied the doctor as they entered the room to share the news with Rick.

“I didn’t know I had cancer, but I knew I wasn’t right,” Rick said, reminiscing as he rested in a recliner in his nearly brand new living room. “When they told me, it was like a peace came over me.

“The first thing I told them was ‘I don’t want to know how long I have to live,’” Rick said. “Only one person knows how long I have to live, and that’s God.” 72

Yvonne, however, did learn of her husband’s medical outlook.

“They told me he only had a few months left to live, and I started boo-hooing. I had to leave the room,” Yvonne said. “But I somehow knew it was all going to be OK in the end.”

BEGINNING A BLESSING Scott Masters had become good friends with Rick by the summer of 2015, as the two had worked alongside each other in the construction field for several years. The two often chatted about their personal lives during downtime at jobsites, but this day was different.

“We were taking a break at work, and we started talking about my house,” Rick said, calling Scott his “Brother from another mother.” “He had seen all the mold and mildew, and he offered to help.”

Scott had been to Rick’s home several times, but had never been inside, as Rick always met him outside. But after offering to help repair the Vanderslices’ home, Scott got his first look inside the aging structure.

“As long as I had known Rick, which had been about 12 years, I knew he needed a new roof,” Scott said. “When I went to validate the project, I went up in the attic to see what we were dealing with. It was just too far gone to repair.

“I wouldn’t have wanted a few birds to land on that roof, much less have a couple of 200-pound men working up there.”

The Vanderslices didn’t know it at the time, but Scott had already presented the project to the board Profile 2017

of what was then known as the Highway 11 Project, which meets monthly at Alabaster First United Methodist Church. Because the Highway 11 Project had outgrown its original service area, the project is now known as the Jesus Works Ministry.

The project is a partnership between several area churches, and originally set out to help those in need along the city’s Highway 11 corridor. When Scott nominated the Vanderslices for the project, it originally involved renovating the family’s existing home.

“When a project is presented to the committee, someone always has to present the project, the solution and the projected cost,” said Werner Beiersdoerfer, a member of the Sanctuary Trust for Shelby County who serves on the project’s board of directors. “After seeing the state of the house they were living in, it was evident from my perspective that we just needed to build them a new house. I thought it was doable and I thought it made sense to do that.”

The project’s board agreed, and the community’s support soon began pouring in.

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A COMMUNITY’S LOVE As word about the project began to spread, area churches and individuals began helping in myriad ways, whether through material donations, volunteered labor time or financial donations.

“The community response was kind of overwhelming,” Scott said. “We began building in January (2016), and they were in the house in April.

“Most of the vendors we went to helped in some way. Some donated materials, some gave us materials at cost,” he added. “We had five professionals and about 20 volunteers who volunteered their time to build the house.”

The Jesus Works ministry, with the help of the Sanctuary Trust for Shelby County, secured a $25,000 line of credit from Central State Bank to cover the costs above the donated materials and labor.

To Scott, building a new home for a family in need perfectly encapsulated what the ministry was intended to accomplish.

LEFT: The Vanderslices’ new home replaced a dilapidated house the couple had lived in for decades. ABOVE: It took only a few months for volunteers and professionals to design, plan and build a new home for the Vanderslice family.

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Scott Masters, center, helped spearhead the effort to build a new home for Rick Vanderslice, left, and Yvonne Vanderslice when Rick was diagnosed with cancer in 2015.

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“I think so many large churches focus on helping in different parts of the world, which is great,” Scott said. “But we have a tremendous need right here at home.”

“It took a lot of prayer from a lot of people to make this happen,” Werner added. “This is the reason churches are here.”

For several weeks – and especially on weekends – the volunteers worked on what was originally intended to be a place for Yvonne to live after her husband passed away.

“It originally was less about Rick and more about (Yvonne). Basically, he was the largest bread provider for the family, and the doctors had given him a terminal cancer diagnosis,” Scott said. “We wanted to make sure she had a place to live after he was gone.”

Having worked in construction for years, Rick, who was undergoing several cancer treatments at the time, admitted it was difficult to sit on the sidelines while the new house went up.

“What hurt me more than the cancer was watching other people do what I wasn’t able to do.

Used to, I could get by with two or three hours of sleep, but now I could sleep 20 hours a day,” Rick said. “But when the volunteers were working, there

was no cussing, no raising voices.”

“When they all pulled up, I said ‘There comes God’s army,” Yvonne added.

Through the leadership of Scott and the other Jesus Works volunteers, the new house went up quicker than expected.

“They put this up in just a few days,” Rick said as he raised his hands. “Only God can do that.”

A MIRACLE IN ACTION A few months before volunteers began working to build the Vanderslices a new home, Rick was faced with a decision.

Although Rick declined to learn his life expectancy when he received his cancer diagnosis, he knew the outlook was bleak after having a discussion with a pastor in his hospital room.

“I kind of knew what was coming when (the pastor) told me I had to get right with God, and I needed to do it now,” Rick said. “But I wasn’t ready to do that. That’s not something, to me, that you can just turn on and off.”

Rick thought about the pastor’s words for a few months, but based his decision on what he was hearing from above.

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“I could see that God was talking to me through everything he was blessing us with,” Rick said. “And one day, probably about one or two months later, I felt it was time to get right with God.” After dedicating his life to Christ, Rick began a long battle against the cancer plaguing his body.

While volunteers worked to construct the family’s new house, Rick was undergoing aggressive chemotherapy and taking powerful medications in an effort to defeat the disease.

Suddenly, his prognosis began to change.

The tumors in his lungs, and on his rib, shoulder blade and spine began to shrink, and his chance of survival began increasing.

In early October 2016 – almost exactly a year after he received a terminal diagnosis – Rick underwent a CAT scan revealing he was cancer-free.

“I just looked up and said ‘Thank you, Lord.’ I didn’t know what else to say,” Rick said as a smile spread across his face. “The doctors said I still had one spot the size of a raisin, but it wasn’t active.

They declared me cancer-free.”

Today, the Vanderslices are enjoying life in their new home while Rick is working to make a full recovery.

“I still get dizzy sometimes, so I don’t drive. I’m still sleeping a lot,” he said. “I’m in the process now of finding a church that’s right for me.”

Since building the Vanderslices’ home, the Jesus Works ministry has gone on to complete many more projects in the community, such as renovating aging homes and even securing a new mobile home for a woman who was living in a dilapidated house about a mile down the road from the Vanderslices.

Battling cancer and — Rick Vanderslice seeing a community come together to help his family has not only given Rick a stronger faith, it has brought him a peace about whatever lies ahead.

“I’m ready for whenever the time comes. I know I’ll be back with my mom and dad and the sister I never knew,” Rick said. “I thank God every day for everything he has blessed us with. Not only with the house and being cancer-free, but also for the friends we’ve gained through this.” 

“Only one person

knows how long I have to live, and that’s God.”

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A true servant’s heart Harpersville’s Theoangelo Perkins ends more than 20 years of service to hometown Story by EMILY SPARACINO Photographs by KEITH MCCOY and CONTRIBUTED

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heoangelo Perkins spoke humbly of his service to Harpersville as its mayor for more than a decade, giving credit to others with whom he worked to move the town forward.

“We’ve been able to accomplish a lot in 12 years, but it’s not because of me,” Perkins said at an appreciation luncheon held in his honor in October.

“It’s because we worked together. This City Council believes in working together.”

The praise Perkins denied himself came back to him in a flood of remarks and written notes

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from dozens of people – family members, longtime friends, co-workers, childhood teachers and other acquaintances – who packed the Bama Budweiser building in Harpersville for his luncheon before his final term as mayor ended.

Although Perkins might be remembered mostly for his time at the helm of town government––and his place in local history as Harpersville’s and Shelby County’s first black mayor––his contributions to Harpersville, his hometown, started more than 20 years ago.

FROM HUMBLE BEGINNINGS TO HIGHER CALLINGS Perkins was raised in Harpersville by his parents, Profile 2017

Theolphus and Frances McGinnis Perkins, who were married for 48 years until Theolphus died in 2013.

The name Theoangelo was a combination of Theolphus and Angelo, a name Frances liked.

When Perkins was a student at Vincent Middle High School, two of his teachers pointed out the deeper significance of his name: ‘Theo,’ which relates to God, and ‘angelo,’ the root of which is angel, or messenger of God. Little did his teachers know he would become a church pastor.

Over the years, the nicknames “Theo” and “Lo Lo” have become the norm for him.

“When I was a kid, my uncle refused to call me Theo, so he took the ‘Lo’ off the end,” he said.

Perkins had a sister, Loretta Yvette Perkins, who died of cancer when he was 16 years old.

Perkins graduated from Vincent High School in 1987. He studied English and history at the University of Alabama and graduated in 1992.

“I worked for Tuscaloosa City Schools for four years, then I moved back here,” Perkins said.

Perkins worked for Shelby County Schools as

an intervention specialist at Vincent Middle High School. He became color guard sponsor, sophomore class sponsor and started and directed the choir for several years.

Singing was not always on Perkins’s radar.

“I’ve sung for a long time,” he said. “I was absolutely terrible at it at first, but I got better at it. I did music workshops at different churches.”

Perkins’s first job with Harpersville was riding on the garbage truck. He also served as a reserve police officer for a period of time.

Perkins worked in education until the end of 2004. In the mid-1990s, he was approached by a member of the Harpersville Town Council about serving the town.

“Bill Kelley said to me, ‘You need to get involved and give back to the community,’” Perkins said. “He asked me if I would serve on the water board.”

With some convincing, Perkins agreed, and in 1996 he was appointed to Harpersville’s water board.

The same year, Perkins was asked and agreed to serve on the town’s planning commission.

When Kelley died in 1998, Perkins was appointed

PAGE 71: Perkins accepts a commendation at a luncheon honoring him for his service to Harpersville in October 2016. LEFT: Perkins, back, is pictured with some of his family members. RIGHT: Perkins, in his younger years, donning a suit and tie.

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to finish his council term for District 1 Place 1.

In 2000, Perkins decided to run for a full, fouryear term in the seat, and he was elected.

As his term came to a close, Perkins said he felt led to run for mayor.

“We had gone through some trying times with the city, and I just felt like I could be a unifying figure and decided to run,” Perkins said.

At first, those close to him were unsure if Perkins was serious about running.

“My parents asked me, ‘Are you sure you want to do this?’” he said. “Once they saw I was going to run, people jumped in and gave their support.”

MISTER MAYOR

Perkins was correct in thinking he could be a unifying presence in the town. Following his first term, he ran and was re-elected to lead the city two more times.

A major thread that knit his terms together, he said, was business growth.

“We have created and fostered a business-friendly environment,” Perkins said. “We’re constantly trying to recruit businesses. One of my slogans has been ‘every business counts.’ They all add up.”

Another highlight of his tenure was the establishment of the Harpersville Library shortly after he took office in 2004. In August 2015, the library moved from its original metal building on Alabama 25 to the historic Borum-Darby house across the street for more space.

GET TO KNOW THEO NICKNAMES: “Theo” and “Lo Lo” PARENTS: Theolphus and Frances Perkins HOMETOWN: Harpersville

EDUCATION: Vincent Middle High School and University of Alabama ATHLETICS: Played football and ran track in high school TALENT: Singing

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JOBS: Real estate agent with Weichert, Realtors – Lowe Realty; bus driver for Shelby County Schools; pastor of Liberty Christian Church

LAST JOB WITH THE CITY OF HARPERSVILLE: Mayor CHILDREN: MaKayla and Kinsley

FIRST JOB WITH THE CITY OF HARPERSVILLE: Riding on the garbage truck

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Other accomplishments included developing a personnel policy, renovating the town’s park and securing 205 acres donated to the town for The Meadows golf course.

Perkins was also at the helm for challenges, including the closure of Harpersville’s municipal court and the economic depression that hit in 2008.

“We weathered that storm to bounce back,” Perkins said. “The city is at a good point financially.”

His decision not to seek re-election in 2016 was bittersweet, but Perkins was optimistic about the town continuing its forward progress.

“We have a great staff,” he said. “It felt like it was

a good time to exit because it’s in good hands. It’s hard to just let it go. It’s been tough, but I’m excited about the future, too.”

STAYING BUSY

LEFT: Perkins holds his two girls. MIDDLE: Perkins smiles at an event in Harpersville. RIGHT: Perkins speaks to a resident at Harpersville Day

Perkins works as a real estate agent with Weichert, Realtors – Lowe Realty based in Columbiana.

Allan Lowe, who works with Perkins at Lowe Realty, emceed Perkins’s appreciation luncheon.

Lowe talked about getting to know Perkins when their mayoral terms overlapped, describing him

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as a “very fine fellow” and a “full-time father” to daughters MaKayla, 9, and Kinsley, 8.

“I don’t have a brother, but I’d like to have one like you,” Lowe said to Perkins at the luncheon. “I wish you well. Thank you for your friendship.”

Perkins pastors Liberty Christian Church, the church he founded in 2003.

“I had pastored a church in Alpine for three years,” Perkins said. “I felt a strong call to plant

“It’s wonderful to live in a town

where people can work together. We’re friends, we’re family. That means a lot.”

— Theoangelo Perkins a church. I prayed about it and decided to go forward.”

He will also continue driving a school bus for Vincent, a job he has held for about 20 years.

Councilwoman Janet Gill thanked Perkins’s family for being patient with interruptions and the time-consuming nature that accompanied his job as mayor. She then commended him for “moving from

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a place that’s comfortable into the unknown.”

“This man has a true servant’s heart,” Gill said.

“He’s willing to sacrifice a lot.”

His daughter Kinsley stood at the podium and thanked her dad for taking care of the community.

“God has been mighty good to all of us,” Perkins’s mother, Frances, said. “Thank the Lord for his love for this city. He couldn’t have done anything without the help of the Lord.”

Perkins said he was not planning to move, and wanted to remain involved in the community.

As the only candidate to qualify for mayor, Don Greene took over for Perkins in November.

“Harpersville has a wonderful staff,” he said. “We have a mayor coming in that’s experienced. The town is in good hands.”

Perkins said he was overwhelmed by the turnout at the luncheon and by the remarks given by family members, colleagues, representatives from county and state organizations.

“It’s wonderful to live in a town where people can work together. We’re friends, we’re family.

That means a lot,” he said. “I do love this town. I’m humbled, honored and I don’t feel like I deserve it. I love what I do. Continue to pray for me. Just listen out for future endeavors.”

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FOR THE HOPELESS Briarwood grad’s ministry making an impact on Native American reservation

Story by STEPHEN DAWKINS Photographs CONTRIBUTED

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eople talk about things that have changed their life, sometimes in a trivial way.

Maybe they discovered a new dessert or coffee drink.

But what about leaving everything and everyone you’ve ever known to try to help people you’ve never met— people who don’t look or act like you, or maybe even dislike you on sight?

Meeting the people of the Yakama Nation reservation in Washington state changed Chris Granberry’s life. He remembers the experience well because the 1998 Briarwood High School graduate lives on the reservation with his wife, children and new family— Native Americans who have become the center of his life’s work.

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A devout Christian, Granberry was serving as youth director at Oak Mountain Presbyterian in the summer of 2000 when he first visited the Yakama reservation.

For a week, the group fixed roofs, painted homes, raked leaves and hauled trash, while offering a children’s ministry each morning.

The youth group had taken mission trips each summer: inner-city Washington, D.C.; Miami and other locations where middle-class folks can discover that poverty is real in the United States, and the visit to Yakama Nation could have been another on a list of mission trips—only this one was different. Granberry returned home, but some part of him could not leave the town of White Swan.

“The children stole my heart,” he said. “I’ve never been the same 81

ABOVE: Chris Granberry along with wife Mary and children Ann Marie, Beth, Morgan and David moved to the reservation in June 2003. RIGHT: Local youth helped with renovations to the church facility.

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since that week in the summer of 2000. I was really shocked at the impact it had on me because I had been other places like Indonesia and Guatemala. I had seen third-world conditions, but honestly the hopelessness and despair I saw on the reservation was much deeper than anything I saw overseas. The sense of desperation in the eyes of the children, teenagers and adults we met…I had experienced poverty before, but I was just completely blown out of the water.

“We got back to Alabama, and nothing had changed but everything was different. I could not stop thinking about the reservation. I didn’t know what to do about it other than pray for the people I met. I tried to go back to life as usual, but I couldn’t forget about that little town of White Swan. I expected all these feelings about the town to just fade away as time went by, but they just got stronger and stronger.”

Granberry wondered whether God was calling him to move his family to White Swan. He wondered why God would choose him—he wasn’t even an ordained minister. Still, the burden only got heavier.

But where to start? Granberry knew of a man who lived in Atlanta who had connections to the White Swan community, so he tried everything he could to

contact him. When he was unsuccessful, doubt crept in.

“He called me two days later out of the blue,” Granberry said. “He didn’t know I had tried to contact him. He literally said, ‘Chris, I don’t know why I’m calling you.’”

Granberry told him that he felt led to start a church in White Swan, and the man told Granberry that he and his wife had been praying for eight years that God would send someone to the community.

‘A LITTLE BIT OF TIME AND JESUS’ Chris Granberry, along with his wife Mary and four children ranging in age at the time from 5 to 10, moved to White Swan in June 2003 to start Sacred Road Ministries.

The Yakama people have historically been closed to non-natives in general, and whites in particular.

People are also guarded because of the problems that are present.

“So many people are doing drugs or selling drugs, or there’s some type of child abuse or domestic violence,” Granberry said. “There is so much stuff in the home that no one wants anyone to know about.

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42 percent of Yakama families live in poverty compared to 11 percent of non-Tribal families in Washington.

A lot of folks are almost like hermits, and they never leave their house either because they have hurt people or somebody has hurt them—or a combination of both.”

Because of this culture, Granberry was told he should not waste his time at the reservation.

“A lot of the experts who have tried to start churches…tried to talk us out of coming,” Granberry said. “They said we would leave in two years. We didn’t know how we were going to break down some of the barriers and reach people.”

The way to the hearts of the Yakama people turned out to be through their children.

Granberry’s church back home had donated a van to the mission. He and his family rode across the country in that van, and in the mission’s earliest days, the van would carry kickballs, sidewalk chalk, snacks and other items to a housing project where the Granberry family would show Yakama children love and affection they may have otherwise never known.

They would also take a book of Bible stories, and at some point during the day, offer to read if the children wanted.

“It turned out that they almost all wanted to hear,” Granberry said. “They had never heard any of these stories before.”

The children started to trust the Granberry family, and the adults soon followed.

“Yakama people think that children have a sixth sense—that children can tell if someone is safe or not,” Granberry said. “If you’re not a safe person, children will stay away from you. We had 30-50 little kids coming out to ‘Kids Club,’ and that really got Profile 2017

the attention of some of the older folks.

“They started to reach out to me as if I was a grandson or son. They started asking if I could give them a ride to go get medicine or groceries, or mow their grass.”

Granberry always obliged, with a goal of treating the Yakama people as if they were relatives—brothers, aunts and grandmothers.

“In native culture, if someone treats you like family, you’re almost obligated to respond in the same way,” he said. “In return, people started loving us back almost right away. People invited us to come to birthday parties and family get-togethers.”

Then, they started asking Granberry to speak at events, even traditional feasts.

At one such feast, an elder questioned Granberry, who wasn’t sure what the elder would think of his explanation that he had left his home and moved his family across the country to a remote reservation town simply to help the people there.

“When he got done asking questions, he shook his head and said, ‘I think you people are just a different type of white people,’” Granberry recalls of an early meeting with Wendell Lee Hannigan.

Hannigan later took Granberry to meet with the tribal council and introduced his new friend with tears in his eyes.

Granberry was intimidated to meet the tribal council—a group of men who lived in parts of the reservation other than White Swan, which is the smallest and poorest town. But as the elders introduced themselves, they each had a story about how Granberry’s mission had helped some friend or relative.

“One spoke up and said that if we could 83

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About 2 percent of U.S. children are Native Americans, but they represent 8.4 percent of total children in foster care.

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The graduation rate from the Yakama Nation Tribal School is as low as 20 percent. The percentage of 12th graders that graduate in the Mt. Adams School district is 57 percent.

do anything good for White Swan, they would support us,” Granberry said. “We didn’t feel like we had anything to offer other than a little bit of time and Jesus.”

Hannigan was born in White Swan and has seen missionaries come and go since he was a child. Some stay for days, some weeks, some years, but they all eventually left.

“Almost nobody leaves a legacy of any sort, but I think what Chris has done is he has made a firm stand—a commitment of his life to establishing something here on the Yakama Reservation,” said Hannigan, who speaks to mission teams that visit the reservation.

“He didn’t have to move.

He didn’t have to uproot his family and transport them to White Swan.

“I’m grateful to Chris for what he has done for our reservation and our people,” said Hannigan, emotion evident in his voice. “Chris has shown love and proven that he can be trusted. He has made the connection with people, and the church has become an important part of the community. The children have something to look forward to.”

of non-tribal families in Washington; the winter unemployment rate is 73 percent; the graduation rate from the Yakama Nation Tribal School is 20 percent; adolescent Native Americans have death rates of two to five times the rate of whites in the same age group; Native American women are twice as likely to be abused than the average white woman; and Native teens have the highest rate of suicide of any population group.

“We minister in a very difficult place,” Granberry said. “Since the treaty established the Yakama Indian Reservation in 1855, the culture, families and dreams of the Yakama people have steadily disintegrated.”

Granberry believes Sacred Road is helping, but the ministry does not attempt to force Native Americans to assimilate to Western culture.

“That’s not something native people are interested in doing,” he said. “It’s not required that someone become white in order to love the — Scott Hannah Lord. The question we ask is, ‘What does it look like to be a Native American believer?’”

Sacred Road Ministries has established a church.

About 400 people are actively involved. Of those, about 200 are teenagers.

About 100 people have been baptized.

The ministry has partnered with Young Life and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes to offer faith-based programs in schools.

Donations poured in from across the country four

“We all see need every

day — you don’t have to look far — but Chris listens. He’s not trying to be a white guy who goes and tells them how to solve all their problems.

He’s really trying to hear them, and it’s that simple.”

‘THE HOPE THAT JESUS GIVES’ Statistics paint a bleak picture for the Yakama people.

A few examples include: 42 percent of Yakama families live in poverty, compared to 11 percent

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: Of the about 400 people actively involved in the church at White Swan, about half are teenagers.

Believers from across the country visit White Swan to help with the ministry.

Children’s well-being remains a centerpiece of Sacred Road Ministries.

Granberry said the ministry does not attempt to assimilate natives to Western culture, instead focusing on “what does it look like to be a Native American believer?”

Granberry’s efforts in an area other missionaries advised him to avoid began with children—simply showing them time and affection. Ties to traditional Native American culture remain strong on the Yakama Reservation.

thesalon5.com Profile 2017

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514

Alcoholism mortality rates among Native Americans are 514 percent higher than the general population.

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years ago when Granberry sent out word that Sacred Road Ministries was considering purchasing a house to be used as a church. Forty days later, there was enough money to purchase the 7,000-square foot building that has been renovated and includes office space, Sunday School rooms, a kitchen that can feed 300 people, worship space and an outdoors deck for meals—all on 38 acres that also holds a playground and basketball court.

The church hosts services on Sundays, youth groups on Tuesday nights with about 100 attendees, discipleship groups on Thursdays and after-school programs for elementary and middle school students.

Kids Club has grown to two locations and sees about 200 children each day.

When Granberry visited the reservation for that life-changing mission trip, about 50 people made the trip for two weeks. Now, about 350 people of various denominations visit every year.

For more information, visit SacredRoadMinistries. com.

“We all agree that Jesus calls us to love our neighbors, and we recognize that the very first neighbors of the American church were Native Americans, but after all of that, only 2-5 percent of our first neighbors claim to be a Christian.”

Scott Hannah is director of the Quest recreation outreach at Briarwood Church. He met Granberry about 20 years ago through the church, stayed in touch through the years and has visited Sacred Road.

“Chris has always been a person who feels the pain and sees the pain of others,” Hannah said. “We all see need every day—you don’t have to look far—but Chris listens. He’s not trying to be a white guy who goes and tells them how to solve all their problems.

He’s really trying to hear them, and it’s that simple.”

Hannah has witnessed Sacred Road’s impact—as have Native American neighbors.

“Now adjacent reservations have seen what’s going on, and they’re wanting Chris to replicate what he is doing on their reservation,” Hannah said.

Granberry said he thinks it is important that he and his family have never had to leave to raise money because of the generosity of believers across the country.

“That is exceptional because so many of the people here are dealing with abandonment,” Granberry said. “Children have been abandoned by fathers, and some have been abandoned by their father and mother. To have a constant and steady presence in the community was important. People are really responding to the hope that Jesus gives.”

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From cleats to clubs Former county resident Al DelGreco succeeds in multiple roles Story by GRAHAM BROOKS Photographs CONTRIBUTED

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former college and NFL star kicker, radio personality, accomplished golfer, father and coach all fit the bill of 54-year-old Al DelGreco.

To say that DelGreco is a versatile guy might be a bit of an understatement.

These days, DelGreco can be found on the bottom floor of Samford University’s Pete Hanna Center where his office features photos of family, friends and awards from his golfing and kicking

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careers. The most important bit of information can be found on the office door, however, that reads “Al DelGreco, head men’s golf coach.”

The journey of DelGreco navigating from Miami, Florida, to Birmingham, has been an interesting ride but it’s one that DelGreco has thoroughly enjoyed with the majority of his time being spent in Shelby County.

GROWING UP DelGreco was born in Providence, Rhode Island, and then moved to Miami, Florida, when he was 4

DelGreco with his family.

Al’s son Trey earned a scholarship to play golf at Vanderbilt University.

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years old. DelGreco spent the majority of his time in Key Biscayne and attended Coral Gables High School where he played football and soccer from 1977-80.

During his years growing up, DelGreco enjoyed golf and soccer and actually learned how to kick a football from former Auburn University placekicker Jorge Portela, who also grew up in Miami.

Before becoming a successful DelG r poin eco am kicker, DelGreco’s first love was on t a retir s and a ssed 1 the links. ,5 t e No. ment, h the tim 92 care e of 11 o er ew “I grew up playing golf when a h n sco ring the NF s ranke is d as I was a little kid and when I was list.

L’s all-t ime about 13 my dad bought a summer membership to the golf course where we lived,” DelGreco said. “It was $100 for the whole summer and you got to play as much golf as you wanted and I would spend 4-5 days out there. It just captivated me I guess. I played in junior high school but I didn’t play in high school because I played soccer instead.”

In high school, DelGreco focused more on soccer

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2

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and football and in the end, the hard work and effort paid off.

“I was the first kicker to ever get a scholarship to Auburn out of high school,” DelGreco said.

“The chance to play college football was huge and Auburn was really the only school that gave me that opportunity.”

TIME AT AUBURN When DelGreco came to Auburn in 1980, he had the opportunity to compete for a starting kicking job right away as the Tigers’ head coach Doug Barfield was the one who offered DelGreco a spot on the team.

“When I got there, I was fortunate enough to win the kicking job my freshman year and my first road game was at TCU, and I think we went 5-6 that year,” DelGreco said. “I just realized my dream came true. I was playing college football at the Division I level in the SEC.” Although DelGreco had a successful freshman season, the team struggled and Auburn brought in a new head football coach by the name of Pat Dye Profile 2017

in 1981 and a new era was born.

“Coach Dye came in and I remember one of the reporters at his first press conference said ‘How long is it going to take you to beat Alabama?’ and his answer was ‘60 minutes,’” DelGreco said. “He also laid out that it’s going to be hard work and I’m going to work the heck out of you. If you want to win, you’re going to have to do what I ask of you.

That winter and that spring practice was just ultimate hell for a lot of guys, and he weeded out the guys who really weren’t there for the right reasons. Two years later we had kind of turned the corner. We beat Alabama and then three years later we won an SEC championship.”

During his time at Auburn, DelGreco completed 110 out of 111 PATs in his career. He also set the Southeastern Conference record for field goal attempts in a game and field goals made in a game when he made six out of his seven attempts against Kentucky in 1983.

DelGreco would later earn his degree from Auburn in 1987.

“Coming out of Auburn I was a free agent and signed with the Dolphins, which was another kind of dream come true to grow up in Miami and follow them in the Super Bowl years and to be able to go to training camp and play in four preseason games with them was really, really cool,” DelGreco said.

“Honestly when I went there it was kind of like Alright I got an — Al DelGreco opportunity to play pro football but am I really good enough to do that?’ I can’t say with 100 percent certainty I knew that. Going through training camp and competing

“The chance to play

college football was huge and Auburn was really the only school that gave me that opportunity.”

LEFT: DelGreco pictured with his family. BELOW: Al DelGreco was the first kicker to ever get a scholarship to Auburn out of high school.

NFL CAREER DelGreco would go on to have a tremendous career in the NFL, which ironically started in his hometown of Miami.

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DEVELOPING AS A GOLFER, HITTING THE AIRWAVES AND GETTING THE CHANCE TO COACH

Al DelGreco spent 17 seasons playing in the NFL with his longest stint being with the Houston Oilers and Tennessee Titans.

like I did even though I got cut on the last cut I still felt like ‘Hey if I get the opportunity I might be good enough to play.’ And then in the middle of October that year Green Bay finally signed me and I went up there and finished that year. Seventeen years later it finally came to an end.”

DelGreco played in the NFL from 1984-2000, where he amassed 1,592 career points and at the time of his retirement, he was ranked as No. 11 on the NFL’s all-time scoring list.

DelGreco played for the Green Bay Packers, the St. Louis/Phoenix Cardinals and the Houston Oilers and Tennessee Titans.

“Knowing that you’re in the NFL playing with the best everywhere and at that time During his time at Auburn, there were 30 jobs available,” DelGreco completed 110 DelGreco said. “It was pretty out of 111 PATs in his special to get the chance and career. to know you were one of those 30 people.”

110 90

During his time in the NFL, DelGreco said he had more time to pick up playing golf, especially during the offseason.

The Celebrity Golf Association took off in the early ‘90s and DelGreco had great success.

“I would play in 4-6 celebrity golf events and you were getting paid and playing for prize money,” DelGreco said. “I had some success doing that and it just seemed like it just built my love for the game and the passion that I had for it over that time.”

In 1993, DelGreco officially moved to Shelby County in large part because of former Alabama football player and Green Bay Packers teammate Paul Carruth.

“I used to go to Birmingham to visit Carruth and he told me about a golf course that was being developed called Greystone,” DelGreco said. “I came and played it and I joined not even living in state, and then as the houses started being constructed I would come back and play golf and it was the exact vision I had of where I wanted to live. In 1993, we bought a lot and we built a home in Greystone and spent 18 terrific years there raising a family and being a part of the Shelby County community.”

During portions of DelGreco’s NFL career, the JOX radio station would occasionally have DelGreco come in as a guest to talk about the Titans and things around the NFL. After retiring from the NFL and while living in Greystone, DelGreco had two job opportunities pop up. One with JOX and another was a chance to coach in the Shelby County area.

“When I retired, there was a kickoff party JOX was having on an afternoon show and I was in there and they were interviewing me and right at that time they were thinking about changing the morning show,” DelGreco said. “They said they were looking for a voice that can represent the Auburn Tigers. They heard me on the radio that day and the general manager said ‘Call him and ask him if he’d be interested in doing this.’ Here we are 11 years later and I get up every morning at 4:15 and get on the radio at 6. I just share my love for sports and Auburn and just life in general. It was kind of an unexpected gift put in front of me.”

Spain Park High School was also being built right around the time DelGreco retired and the school reached out to the former star kicker and Profile 2017

established golfer.

“They reached out and said ‘We’d love to have you help out with the football team and be the golf coach,’” DelGreco said. “I thought about that for a little while and it just seemed like it was a perfect fit. My kids were at the age where they were going to start high school in a couple of years. We grew the program pretty well. We won our first state championship his senior year and then won two more after that. I guess that’s when the coaching bug kind of got me. I can still stay around the game, I can still be influential and maybe the biggest thing is be a good example for the kids.”

During DelGreco’s 10 seasons coaching the

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Spain Park boys golf team, the Jaguars won three state championships from 2008-2010, finished as a state runner-up and three individuals won state championships.

DelGreco with members of the Samford golf team. DelGreco became the men’s golf coach at Samford in May 2014.

THE MOVE TO SAMFORD DelGreco’s final season as the Spain Park boys golf coach came in 2010 because of the success his son Trey was having on the golf course.

Trey, who played high school golf at Spain Park for his dad, received a four-year scholarship to play golf at Vanderbilt University and DelGreco wanted to be there for his son.

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“I was missing seeing him play in his tournaments and it was something that I gave up the coaching at Spain Park so I could watch him his last two years,” DelGreco said. “When I left coaching golf I missed it, I’ll be honest with you. In 2012, I was going through a divorce and I had everything going with JOX in the morning and it just seemed like I had all this time in the afternoon. The job came open here at Samford and I sent them an email about the men’s coaching job. Within half an hour I had a voicemail saying when can you come in? We met probably four or five times and then made sure JOX was OK with my requirements here and that Samford was OK with my requirements I had at JOX and both sides agreed. Now I feel like I have the best of both worlds.”

DelGreco was hired as the Samford University men’s golf coach in May 2014 and has spent the last three years in the position.

“It’s kids at a different age now and a different part of their life but it’s still kind of a mentoring thing with me that I want them to know how to compete,” DelGreco said. “I want them to know how to overcome adversity, I want them to know how to represent not only the school but represent

their family and themselves everywhere they go and in everything they do. To me grades and attendance in class is very important, which is what Samford portrays.”

LOOK TO THE FUTURE Currently, DelGreco co-hosts “The Opening Drive” radio show from 6-10 a.m. on JOX each weekday morning and also serves as the Samford men’s golf coach and he feels like he is in a great spot.

“I feel very fortunate where I sit and the last seven years you look at what’s gone on in this state,” DelGreco said. “It’s either been Alabama or Auburn playing for the National Championship and I don’t think that’s ever going to happen again. The fact that we got to experience that on the radio show for the better part of our career so far has made it a whole lot of fun. Then the opportunity here at Samford where it keeps me around golf. I get to practice or play with the kids when I want to. I get to travel and take them to tournaments and at 54-years-old I don’t feel like I’m a 54-yearold guy. I feel younger than that and I think the two jobs that I have present that opportunity to me.”

2016

2016

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Shel b y C ounty Sc hool s

E v ery Student a Graduate.

E v ery G raduate Prepared.

Shel by C ounty Sc hool s BOARD OF EDUCATION

Aubrey Miller President

Peg Hill Vice President

Jane Hampton

Jimmy Bice

Kevin Morris

A M essage F rom SUPERINTENDENT RANDY FULLER “Prepared for the Journey” is the core message of the Shelby County School District. We are a community of stakeholders working together to ensure our students have the resources and support necessary to make a successful transition into each new stage of their journey.

Our district has enjoyed a rich tradition of excellence in education for many years. Through the efforts of our faculty, staff, and administrative leaders, along ith the support of our parents, government officials, business leaders, and citizens, we have maintained a position as one of the most outstanding school systems in the state of Alabama.

Designed with the future in mind, Shelby County Schools give students the tools they need to succeed. From our state-of-the-art recreation and learning environments e uipped ith first rate safety features to innovative curriculum like robotics, engineering, culinary arts, health sciences, and many other college and career ready courses we are dedicated to our mission – to make every student a graduate and every graduate prepared.

For the success of our students and our stakeholders, Shelby County Schools is “Prepared for the Journey”.

Sincerely,

Prepared for the Jou rney

Preparing Students for EXCELLENCE

A

From the moment our students begin their educational journey with the Shelby County School District, a world of excellence awaits. We take great pride in being among the 16 school districts to receive an “A” rating assigned by AL.com based on recent accountability data released by the Alabama State Department of Education. Shelby County Schools was the only county district, as well as the largest, included on the list of “A” school districts. It has taken the collective effort of everyone in our school district to reach this level of excellence. Every day, our district strives to live up to its motto “Prepared for the Journey” by focusing on the critical thinking skills and soft skills that help students achieve academic success and help prepare them for the next journey that awaits them.

Preparing Students for the 21st CENTURY If you thought learning was just the three R’s, you haven’t seen the amazing projects our students are working on daily in engaging 21st Century classrooms. Students are learning automation and robotics, printing computer models with 3-D technology, and programming computer code at all grade levels. Whether it is music and art, business and finance, engineering or health sciences, we’re teaching students to dream bigger and be unafraid to go where their imagination leads them. Our partnerships with local businesses and industries are giving students the hands-on skills that will translate into exciting careers in the future.

Preparing Students for LEADERSHIP Shelby County Schools is committed to helping our students excel in all areas, from academics, athletics, performing arts, extra-curricular activities, and community service. We are preparing our students for all levels of leadership. We are teaching them the lifelong values of teamwork, selfdiscipline, intregrity and commitment. Our focus on leadership development is exemplified across all grade levels with peer mentoring programs; school/community service projects; the Leader-inMe program; and student participation in clubs, organizations, and JROTC. Our annual High School Leadership Conference, which draws over 400 students, is not only an avenue for students to learn leadership, but to put it into practice. Organized by student leaders, the event encourages participants to take the knowledge learned and give back to their local schools and communities through a county-wide service project.

Graduation Rates Shelby County District - 95% Calera High - 97% Chelsea High- 93% Helena High - 97% Montevallo High - 97% Oak Mountain High - 97% Shelby County High - 92% Vincent High - 96% The Shelby County School District is preparing our students to not only graduate, but to be successful at the next level - regardless of whether they plan to attend college, join the military, or transition into a career.

The Shelby County District currently has a graduation rate of 95%, well above the state average of 89%. Shelby County’s graduating Class of 2016 from the seven high schools earned a collective amount of $27.5 million in college scholarships.

Shelby County’s Career and Technical Education programs are preparing both college and career-bound students for future careers through authentic learning experiences centered around 16 career clusters. These programs, which are provided in all middle schools, high schools, and at the College and Career Center, are technical, rigorous, relevant, and are aligned with Business/Industry Standards to help prepare students for the workforce of tomorrow.

We are dedicated to fulfulling our mission statement to make every student a graduate and every graduate prepared!

HELENA: Main Street around 1913

THEN and NOW Profile 2017

A look at some of the historic locations in Shelby County and how the march of time has affected these locations.

Photographs by KEITH MCCOY and SHELBY COUNT Y MUSEUM AND ARCHIVES 97

SILURIA: Siluria Buck Creek Cotton Mills around 1920. Siluria is a former town and now a community in Alabaster.

The Buck Creek Cotton Mills company built mill village, which began operations in 1896 and finally closed in 1979. It was named Buck Creek Cotton Mills in 1911 and in 1953 a tornado destroyed much of the town of Siluria. The town of Siluria was annexed by Alabaster in May 1971. Most of the mill has been demolished and is now the current site of the city of Alabaster Municipal Complex. All that remains of the mill is the iconic water tower.

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CALERA: The original photo is believed to have been taken around 1850. Cecil Cowart took over this building and named it Cowart Drug Co. in 1920. Cecil passed it on to his son Steve Cowart. Steve sold the business to Teresa Harris in the the 1980s, who owned the location until the current owner Kacie White bought the business in 2014. The Masons used the upstairs as their meeting location in Calera, as the Masonic symbol is visible in both images has been there since before 1850.

VINCENT: The Raley House was constructed in 1890 and this photo is believed to be from the early 1900s. William Raley, the original owner of the house, was a farmer but also owned a store and a sawmill. He was one of Vincent’s early mayors and his gifts of lumber from the sawmill built a school for his employees’ children and the Methodist Church in 1891.

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WILSONVILLE: Wilsonville Elementary in the early 1900s. The first Wilsonville school was damaged by a fire and replaced with this version shown. The school has grown over the years, but the structure of this original school remains.

The original building was used as a gym and performance hall for years and was upgraded to a library in 2014.

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ALABASTER: The Alabaster Cash Store and the Alabaster Service and Garage building has recently been restored by Ty Quarles, a developer who also serves on the Alabaster School Board. The newly renovated building plans to have a bakery/pastry shop, bridal store and office space. Original photo is circa 1930.

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WILTON: The current Town Hall in Wilton was built in 1934 after the town’s original Town Hall was lost to a fire. The current Town Hall’s second floor was once used as the town jail and is now the mayor’s office. Photo circa 1960.

COLUMBIANA’S COURTHOUSE: Circa 1907.

The current courthouse was finished in 1908.

e l fi o Pr 2017

What’s inside: YEAR PERSON OF THEney in Pelham native Sw le leads Tigers to tit

LLING FINDING HER CA struggles Walker overcomes to find success

on A special publicati Newspapers, Inc. of Shelby County

ISTORY’

‘HE IS LIVING H

Johnson recalls rmingham Civil Rights-era Bi

PROUD TO PRINT THIS YEAR’S PROFILE 2017. w w w. p u b l i c a t i o n s p r e s s . c o m 884 Lagoon Commercial Boulevard | Montgomery, AL | 334.244.0436

The

Patriarch

Yancey makes a habit of praying with both his team and his opponents after each game.

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Briarwood legend isn’t slowing down Story by BAKER ELLIS Photographs by KEITH MCCOY

H

is office is small. Unassuming even.

Located deep inside the high school where he has been working for longer than any student attending has been alive, there is nothing grandiose or even slightly noteworthy about this room from the outside.

Inside, the four walls are strewn with memories that highlight pieces of the picture his career has painted, but still, the most noteworthy element of this place is precisely how ordinary it seems.

The man occupying the room is slender, but there is no doubting his strength. At the spry age of 71, his blue eyes are as sharp as ever, missing nothing and taking in everything behind his trademark, oval reading glasses. His crew-neck sweatshirt is likely older than most of the players he coaches, but, like its owner, shows no signs of wearing down. With a host of other obligations no doubt constantly tugging at his sleeve, needing to be dealt with, he is a master at making whoever he is talking to feel valued. His

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smile is contagious, and his voice crackles with the passion of a man who has never doubted he is fulfilling his life’s calling. His name is Fred Yancey, and he’s one of the best football coaches this state has ever seen.

Yancey has been Briarwood Christian School’s

A staple of Yancey’s career has been the enthusiasm his players have for the game.

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Even at halftime of a playoff game, Yancey remains calm, especially when addressing his team.

head football coach since 1990. Since arriving, he has amassed a 255-91 record, good for a winning percentage hovering around 74 percent. He is one of only 16 high school coaches in the history of the state of Alabama to win at least 250 football games, and of that group is one of only two coaches, alongside Buddy Anderson of Vestavia Hills, who has spent his entire career in the state at one school.

He has coached one undefeated team, has won at least 10 games in 14 different seasons, has made the playoffs in an incredible 24 consecutive seasons and has won 15 region titles to go along with three state championships. When talking about the most successful high school football coaches ever to stalk a sideline in this state, Fred Yancey has emphatically earned a spot in that discussion.

While his accomplishments on the gridiron are historic by themselves, wins and losses are not the measurement by which Yancey marks his success.

A man of sound faith who has a love for people, the impact he leaves on his players lives on long after the glow from the Friday night lights has dimmed on their prep careers.

THE EARLY YEARS

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Since he has been at Briarwood for nearly three decades now, it can be easy to assume Yancey is an Alabama native, which he isn’t. Born and raised in Memphis, Yancey spent the first 40-plus years of his life outside the state. An avid sports fan and participant from a young age, Yancey knew early on what it was he wanted to do with his life. His first job out of college was at Overton High School in Memphis, and he couldn’t believe his luck.

“I was an assistant football coach, the assistant basketball coach, assistant track coach and I taught five American histories, and they actually paid me $6,200 to do all that,” Yancey said in a Nov. 2, 2016 interview with a smile. “I couldn’t believe it. I mean they were paying me money to do something that was just so much fun.”

Yancey reminisces on that time and that opportunity with obvious fondness. The love he had for his work fresh out of college is still with him today, which is a rare and wonderful thing.

“I love teaching,” he said simply. “That was a great beginning for me, because everything I had wanted to do professionally was to coach and be a teacher, and I was getting to do it right away, and I’ve really never looked back.”

While there have no doubt been tough and trying Profile 2017

The Yancey Years

Yancey’s tenure at Briarwood has been marked by historic success. Each football represents one win.

1990 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016

times over the course of his career, Yancey remains a shining example of a man who has been able to hold on to the feeling that first swelled in his chest during the fall of 1969.

“I always just felt like this is what the Lord wanted me to do,” Yancey said simply. “I never looked around for anything else or thought I was in the wrong place. I’ve just always loved education, and I have always just thought of myself as a school man.”

Yancey got his first opportunity to be a head football coach at Towering Oaks School in 1974,

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also located in Memphis, when he was 29 years old. The differences between his assistant coaching positions before and his first head coaching role were immediate and palpable first and foremost, and also helped bring home a valuable lesson.

“The weight of responsibility increased immediately,” Yancey said. “When I was an assistant coach, I really had a lot of answers. I had answers to stuff I had no business having answers to. I just was the smartest guy at Overton High School when I was an assistant. But when I became the head coach

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that weighed heavier on me. I didn’t feel burdened by it, but there was just a difference there.

“All of the sudden I realized it was time for me to truly grow up,” he continued. “As both a professional and as a coach. I needed to lead others way more than I’d ever had to lead before. It challenged me to seek out help from other people. I didn’t mind getting help from anybody. One of the things I tried really hard to do once I became a head coach was to understand that I didn’t have all the answers.”

His time at Towering Oaks was followed by a small stint as an administrator at the Southern Baptist Educational Center in Memphis before he took a position as the head of a small school in Eatonton, Georgia, where he was also able to coach football and track. After a few years in Georgia, and with the desire to get his children into Christian education, he took a position as the dean of students and athletic director at Evangelical Christian School, back in Memphis. ECS at the time had a very successful and long-time varsity football coach, which meant

Yancey took over as the freshman coach. What he could have viewed as something of a coaching demotion became instead something of a teaching point.

“I found out real quick, it doesn’t matter what level you’re coaching, coaching is coaching,” he said. “It was great fun.

We had some real good teams, I loved it. It was a step down athletically, but it was worth it.”

Then, in 1990, with his oldest son heading into his junior year at ECS, Yancey accepted a position as the dean of students and head football coach at a new school in a new city, and quickly made his mark.

“Sometimes I’ll see a

LEFT: Yancey, always watching, rarely is caught flat-footed as a coach.

MIDDLE: Yancey, at the age of 71, says he feels as good as he did when he was 35. RIGHT: The Briarwood football office is strewn with pictures and memorabilia recapping the historic success Yancey has overseen.

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former player and I don’t remember his name, but I’ll remember his number.

They’d rather me remember their number than their name any day.

The Lord has just helped me with that, it’s been a neat touch.”

CREATING A DYNASTY Briarwood Christian

— Fred Yancey resembled ECS closely, which is in part what helped ease the move for the Yanceys, as he and his wife were always firmly committed to educating their children in a Christian school setting. While he was confident the move was the right choice, his oldest son Bart struggled with the decision at first. A talented young quarterback with a strong arm, Bart

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went on to be a four-year starter at Samford University, but in that moment as a junior in high school, it wasn’t ideal.

“He didn’t feel great about that move, it about broke his heart,” Yancey said of his son. “Until we were here for a little while and he realized that the Lord was still in control of his life and in control of all our lives.”

In the two years prior to Yancey’s arrival, Briarwood had gone a paltry 3-16 at the 3A level. In 1990, with his son under center, the Lions went 11-2 and made an appearance in the third round of the playoffs, which had never been done before.

“I’ve always considered that 1990 team about the most fun team I’ve ever coached,” Yancey said. “Every game those kids were just so thrilled and excited, and it meant a lot to them. It was a real special start.”

While that 1990 season was an obvious harbinger of things to come for the marriage between Yancey and Briarwood, there was still a rough patch at the start. The next two seasons, from 199192, still stand as the only two years a Yancey-coached Briarwood team has not made the playoffs, as those teams went 5-5 and 4-6. During that time the Lions were building up their youth football program, which was nonexistent before Yancey arrived and is now one of Briarwood’s biggest strengths, according to Yancey. From 1993-95 the Lions made the playoffs each year and were trending in the right direction, but were by no means elite.

Heading into his seventh year at Briarwood, however, Yancey received some advice that he believes changed everything.

At a coaching clinic at Memphis State in the spring of 1996, Yancey ran into longtime Hartselle head coach Don Woods.

Woods asked Yancey if he was running a two-platoon system, which is a system where players only play one position and don’t play both offense and defense. Yancey, who routinely had less than 40 kids on his team, said he didn’t think he had the numbers for such a system. Woods assured him that he did, which caught

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Yancey talks to his team at the conclusion of a pregame walk-through.

stint in which Briarwood won 100 games, lost just Yancey’s attention.

“He said, ‘You take a quarterback, a wide receiver 12 and won three state titles. Always willing to take advice and always trying to learn, the system he had and a running back, and then give the next 11 inherited from Woods, to put it lightly, worked. players to your defensive coach, will he have a good Briarwood won back-to-back 3A titles in 1998defense?’” Yancey recalled. “I told him we’d have a 99 and showed no signs of slowing down heading real good defense if those boys didn’t play anything else. He said, ‘Build your offense around those other into the new millennium when the private-school multiplier was put into effect. The three guys with what’s left.’” new rule, handed down by the Yancey took Woods’ advice that fall, AHSAA, stated that private schools and for two weeks in spring practice his had to multiply their true enrollment offense was annihilated by his defense. by 1.35 for the purposes of athletic “For two weeks in the spring our classification, which pushed Briarwood defense killed us,” Yancey said. “We from the 3A level up to 5A. didn’t make one first down in two At the end of the 2016 In 5A ball the Lions had three weeks, until the last day of spring football season, straight seasons of either 11 or 12 wins practice we made one first down.

Fred Yancey had the before winning the 5A state title in But that’s all I needed, just a little fifth-most wins among 2003 with a 13-2 record. His teams encouragement for those guys.” active Alabama high school coaches were more prepared for 5A ball than That 1996 team went undefeated with 255.

Yancey originally thought, and there in the regular season, ending the year is no telling how many straight state as the top-ranked team in 3A before titles the Lions might have won playing at the 3A finishing 13-1. The defense that year gave up less level. than 10 points per game while the offense came “It would have probably been a double-figures around and averaged nearly 26 a game, and Yancey was named the Coach of the Year at the 3A level by number (of state titles) if we’d been playing in the ASWA. That year was the start of an eight-year that classification for all those years,” Yancey said,

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without a hint of a brag in his voice.

A GIFT While Yancey obviously has a mind for football schemes and in-game adjustments, one of the more remarkable attributes of Yancey’s persona is his memory. No year runs together, he can pinpoint games and plays from seasons 20 years in the past with alarming accuracy, and he can do the same with players from the past. Over the course of his career he has had countless boys pass through his program, and there are few he doesn’t remember.

“Over the years it’s been kind of fun and funny,” Yancey said.

“Sometimes I’ll see a former player and I don’t remember his name, but I’ll remember his number. They’d rather me remember their number than their name any day. The Lord has just helped me with that, it’s been a neat touch.”

When Yancey won his 250th game as Briarwood’s head coach midway through the 2016 season in a 43-21 win over Shelby County, a number of those former players reached out to him, including the best high school player Yancey ever coached, former five-time First Team All-State selection Tim Castille.

“That was mighty nice of all those guys,” Yancey said. “It meant a lot.”

The number of former players, spanning a wide range of ages, who reached out to share their congratulations with their former coach speaks more to Yancey’s impact than almost anything else.

NOT DONE YET At 71 years of age, the question is simply inescapable. How much longer, exactly, can you keep doing this?

It’s a question he doesn’t try to avoid, and one he has no doubt fielded numerous times. In response, Yancey is somewhat ambiguous with how much longer he’ll be around.

“It boils down to a couple of things,” Yancey said. “One, if I’m effective. I count on my bosses to keep me there. As long as I’m doing a good job they’ll let me know and if they ever feel like something’s slipping they’ll let me know that too. Two, that I still feel great, and I do. I feel as good as I did when I was 32. I love doing what I do, and I feel good.”

It is true that Yancey still moves as well, if not better, than men half his age, and from a physical standpoint shows no signs of slowing down. Nevertheless, there will obviously come a day when Yancey leaves this school and rides off into the sunset, leaving behind quite a large pair of shoes to fill. When that day comes, whenever it is, there will no doubt be more articles written and more celebrations held in his honor. But that day is not yet upon us.

And until that day comes the Patriarch of Briarwood football will still be here, spending his time either in this unassuming office, in the weight room just down the hall or on the football field that he has come to know so intimately, still not quite believing that someone is paying him to have so much fun.  Profile 2017

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Katie Kiefer has been the force behind the Calera Goes Pink fundraising effort for years.

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Calera goes

PINK Meet the force behind the movement

Story by GRACE THORNTON Photograph by KEITH MCCOY

K

ate Kiefer says research isn’t sexy — but it saved her life.

“I’m a melanoma cancer survivor of 34 years,” she said. “I was in Atlanta and fortunate enough to qualify for a clinical trial at Emory.”

Research, she said, is critical to finding a cure, and someone donated the funds for the treatment that gave her 34 more years and counting.

“I’m a recipient of how somebody paid money for me,” she said, “and now I want to help pay that forward.”

That’s why Kiefer is the force behind Calera Goes Pink, the breast cancer research fundraising effort that takes over the Shelby County community every October.

It all started six years ago with a football game, she said, and just got bigger and bigger from there.

Kiefer, president of the board of directors for the Breast Cancer Research Foundation of Alabama, had contacted Fire Chief Sean Kendrick about selling T-shirts to go toward research.

He said yes — but he told Kiefer he thought they could do something bigger than that.

The next thing she knew, the local high school football team had gone pink at a special game, and students and teachers had gotten involved in a whole host of activities to raise money the week before.

Then it spread to the community.

“A lot of the retail shops will decorate their storefronts, and we have a contest to name the winners every year,” Kiefer said. “It’s

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doing so much to raise awareness.”

And this past year at a benefit golf tournament, they had to turn people away because they had so many entrants, she said. “This year put us close to $200,000 raised over the past six years.”

Mayor John Graham said he’s “very proud” of how the city raised such a large amount for research.

“The unity of the city, our schools, local businesses and Calera residents allow us to grow our fundraising efforts for breast cancer research each year,” he said. “Kate has been very instrumental in bringing — Kate Kiefer our city together and helping us accomplish that goal and help us fight that fight together.

She’s a hard worker and dedicated to the research foundation, and we’re glad to be a part of it.”

Kiefer said she’s encouraged by the strides being made in research, even though she said it’s not sexy stuff to talk about.

“There are some of our local researchers who

“This isn’t about me,

this is about that little town of Calera with a big heart.”

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believe we will see a cure in our lifetime, and women get behind causes like that,” she said. “It’s not just a black hole of research fundraising — it’s really going to treat women and find cures that work.”

This year’s check presentation of funds raised in the fall of 2016 has a specific target — the Dolly Ashton O’Neal Triple Negative Breast Cancer Personalized Medicine Program, which will give 20 patients personalized breast cancer treatment plans through genomic analysis and drug screens.

It’s a collaborative project of the UAB Comprehensive Cancer Center, HudsonAlpha Institute of Biotechnology and the Southern Research Institute.

“We have some of the largest and best breast cancer research facilities in the nation right here in our backyard,” Kiefer said, noting that Calera is helping keep the wheels turning toward a cure.

“This isn’t about me, this is about that little town of Calera with a big heart,” she said, noting that she’s hoping that spirit will keep spreading to surrounding communities. “I couldn’t be happier or more proud to be a part of this group.

It’s a grassroots effort, and the energy people put into it is phenomenal. And one day it’s going to work.” 

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