Richard J. Alley

Cover story for the Rhodes Magazine

Winter 2013

In the 1920s, the college published a code for athletes. Heading the list:

“As an athlete I am determined to play the game to the limit of my capacities, giving each detail the greatest care and attention.”It holds true today, as then, at play and in the classroom.

At the far north end of the Rhodes College campus stands a citadel of sweat, an acropolis of aches and a fortress of fortitude. The Bryan Campus Life Center (BCLC) is where the athletic administration offices can be found, past fitness rooms and down long hallways adorned with trophies and plaques and photos of athletes who won them for the college.

The tradition doesn’t stop with photos, though; it is also in the air, mixed within the mortar and stone and on polished woodwork. The William Neely Mallory Gymnasium, built in 1954 and dedicated to the 42 alumni who perished in World War II, is where the men’s and women’s basketball teams tip off, and the volleyball team rallies, atop the Lynx paw at mid-court. If nearby Paul Barret Jr. Library is the brain of the campus, then the BCLC is its muscle, flexed daily and stretched with dedication and passion by the student-athletes within. In its shadow, a bright light in its own right, is Crain Field, which was refurbished with state-of-the-art synthetic FieldTurf, a gift of Brenda and Lester Crain Jr. ’51 in honor of his father, J. Lester Crain Sr. ’29, at the start of the 2012 football season … (read more)

Annual “20 under 30″ issue highlighting 20-somethings making great strides in the city for The Memphis Flyer

Jan. 24, 2013

These young people have graduated from their teens with a sense of responsibility beyond their years, and it is driving them to do good, to leave Memphis a better place. Within their ranks, there are advanced college degrees and long hours spent learning and perfecting a craft. The members of this group can dribble a ball, carry a tune, cook a meal, tell a joke, take a picture, book a show, raise money, raise awareness, and raise us all up if we put ourselves in their capable, young hands.

Each is an ambassador for our city. They are giving their best to make themselves and their community a better place to live and to visit.

News of violence and scandal can make the future seem bleak, but we can rest easier knowing that these 20 men and women are a part of that future. Keep an eye on them and watch what they can do when they put their minds and hearts to it … (read more)

Flyer cover 2013

Faith in Memphis feature for The Commercial Appeal

Sept. 29, 2012

Having spent years in professional soccer as a player and a coach, National Soccer Hall of Famer Kyle Rote Jr. understands that professional athletes don’t work on the field forever. Rote also understands that human beings have interests and passions beyond their jobs and that, to be happy and fulfilled, some sort of activity and calling post-competition — a second half, if you will — needs to be in place.

Rote coached the Memphis Americans of the Major Indoor Soccer League, founded the sports agency Athletic Resource Management Inc., and is the current chairman of the national Fellowship of Christian Athletes soccer ministry board. As a way to bring the Christian organization and soccer closer together, a first-ever soccer-specific ministry has been developed for the FCA with Memphian and Houston High School graduate Ross Paule tapped as executive director.

Paule grew up in a Catholic household and began playing soccer at age 4. He was drafted by the Colorado Rapids of Major League Soccer out of Creighton College in 1997, and went on to play professionally for nine years for Colorado, the New York/New Jersey MetroStars and Columbus Crew.

His retirement from the pitch was precipitated by health reasons after a number of concussions in his last few years of playing. His dedication to soccer, however, didn’t dissipate with his retirement, and he stayed active in his career’s second half with coaching for MLS, as youth director of the Memphis Futbol Club, owner of Realpro Soccer Programs, executive director of the Arlington Soccer Academy and with his concentration in FCA … (read more)

Small business spotlight for The Memphis Daily News & The Memphis News

Aug. 13, 2012

Breakaway Running is a small business with the steady, even stride it takes to endure for more than three decades.

Begun in 1981 by a handful of area running enthusiasts as an outlet to get their own gear and to accommodate the legions of Memphis runners, the shop has come full circle, having recently been bought by Barry Roberson, the shop’s first manager.

“The whole reason the store was open, those guys felt there were a few needs not being met and they loved running and I love running,” said Roberson, who has spent the past 19 years in real estate before delving back into the business of running. “We’re probably more runners, and always have been, than business people.”

Business minded or not, the store has prospered and grown over the years, moving locations in 2008 from a large house at Union Avenue and Belevedere Boulevard, where Roberson lived on the second floor in the beginning, to another Union location down the street. Further east, they’ve been at various locations with the current home being on Germantown Road.

“The trails are the reason we moved out there in Germantown,” Roberson said, referring to the nearby trailhead for the Wolf River Greenway and off-road trails. “That’s just proven to be great.” … (read more)

Health & Fitness story for The Commercial Appeal

July 16, 2012

Ken Hall took his mother to the hospital last year for complications from congestive heart failure and kidney issues on the same day. While there, she was diagnosed with diabetes, a disease his father had already been diagnosed with. “It occurred to me that my dad’s taking insulin shots twice a day, now she’s going to have to start, I’m next,” Hall said. “It’s like a time bomb.”

As a proactive measure at the beginning of the year, Hall, director of communications for Leadership Memphis, set out to lose 20 pounds by his 50th birthday in February. His mission was accomplished by cutting out his almost daily fast-food drive-through habit and saying “no” to the Hostess cupcakes. As far as any previous exercise routine, Hall said, he “really tried to avoid it.” But with his new lifestyle came new habits, and working out on the elliptical machine for a half-hour every day was one.

“It was pretty darn easy,” he said of entering this regimen and his subsequent weight loss.

For 40-year-old Heather Griffin, the hardest part of her lifestyle change was cutting out sweets. “I’m a cupcake freak,” she laughs, “so in giving that up, that was more painful than running a half-marathon, actually.” … (read more)

Health & Fitness feature story for The Commercial Appeal

April 9, 2012

Leanna Tedford was athletic growing up in Clarksdale, Miss., where she played four sports in high school. In college, however, those active ways were pushed to the side and the weight gain that goes along with more sedentary days became inevitable and, seemingly, a way of life.

But then she began talking with personal trainer Clark Butcher.

Butcher, owner of Propel Endurance Training and co-owner of Victory Bicycle Studio, has been a competitive cyclist since he was 16. He’s been coaching for a dozen years, having gone into the business while a student at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colo., at age 18 when he was finally eligible for liability insurance.

The Cordova High School graduate has raced competitively in the United States, Canada and Europe, and is a certified USA Cycling coach (USA Cycling is the governing body of all cycling events in the country).

Butcher worked with Tedford to develop an exercise and diet program that would benefit her overall health while not being too obtrusive to the late-night lifestyle of the popular Memphis bartender for Jim’s Place East. He noted that “the idea came about over beers and fries at the Hi-Tone.” … (read more)

Feature profile for The Commercial Appeal

Oct. 16, 2011

To hear Emil Henry tell it, climbing the Matterhorn at 55 years old wasn’t so difficult. There was little training, only to be tested on skills, endurance and altitude sickness; it wasn’t even a life’s dream.

“As tall, high mountains go, it’s probably the easiest of all the high mountains in the Alps now,” Henry said of the summit that has seen 431 deaths, 58 in the 21st century alone.

Researching and writing a biography of Edward Whymper, the first person ever to scale the 14,690-foot mountain, however, became a monumental task of endurance, travel and expense. And a challenge he wouldn’t give up for anything.

“It turned out to be the most enjoyable occupation of my life,” Henry said of the book, “Triumph and Tragedy: The Life of Edward Whymper” ($18.31).

Henry, now 82 with three children and five grandchildren, began life in Memphis, growing up in Chickasaw Gardens before going away to a boarding high school in Pennsylvania and college at Yale. He joined the Navy during the Korean War, spending three years on a destroyer in the Pacific Ocean, and then went to Vanderbilt for law school.

After practicing law in Memphis for five years, he was appointed to the Federal Communications Commission in 1962. When the chairman resigned only eight months later, Henry was appointed, “at the ripe old age of 34,” chairman of the FCC by President John F. Kennedy … (read more)

A publication of The Mississippi River Corridor – Tennessee

Summer 2011

Project writer responsible for all editorial content of this 32-page magazine. Stories written include: Reelfoot Lake: Facts & Folklore; Victorian Village; Farmers Markets & Local Farm Tours; Dyersburg River Center & Park; Dr. Peter Brown & the Dyersburg State Community College Ornithology & Fauna Collection; The Civil War Trail; Harahan Bridge Project; Historic Town Squares.

2011 River Times magazine

Because I Said So column for The Commercial Appeal

Oct. 14, 2010

I rounded up the family last weekend and herded them to our neighborhood’s block party celebrating the opening of the Memphis Greenline. Along the way we joined up with others like us, neighbors on bikes and on foot, pulling wagons and pushing strollers. Our arrival took on the look and feel of a parade, with the intersection of Podesta and the Greenline buzzing excitedly with talk of the neighborhood’s newest amenity.

People were greeting friends from across the city, eating hamburgers and hot dogs and listening to live music while the Boll Weevils handed out beads and merriment.

The party was everything the naysayers say Memphis is not. It was friendly and safe; it was communal and progressive.

Bikers, runners and walkers asked one another where they’d come from, where they were going and where their neighborhood lies in relation to the line. The answers varied — Binghamton, High Point Terrace, East Memphis and Shelby Farms beyond — and ultimately blurred together, because thanks to the Greenline, our neighborhoods are anyplace we can travel to easily and safely to work, live and play.

The Greenline is our city’s newest social network, the ribbon of asphalt acting as a common thread to stitch together neighborhoods and communities. “Online” took on new meaning as people of all races raced across town to see what was new, to learn where this new avenue leads. Two wheels and a chain are now doing what so many have tried over the years in bringing a city together.

Spandex and bicycle helmets may very well be the true equalizer … (read more)

Small Business Spotlight for The Memphis Daily News

July 26, 2010

John Lintner loves to run.

“I run about four to six miles a day, and nine to 10 miles on the weekends,” he said. “I’ve run four marathons.”

A certified personal trainer and head of sales for Breakaway Running’s bulk embroidery division, Lintner recently trained his wife, Crissy, for her first major race, the 13.1-mile Germantown Half Marathon.

“Whenever we weren’t fighting, it was fun,” John Lintner said.

The two newlyweds – married last September – have recently taken their love of running, the outdoors and a healthy lifestyle to a new level by starting Rockin’ Running Tours.

The idea is simple: take visitors to the city on a three- or six-mile tour of Downtown Memphis at their own pace, at street level, where they can take the time to see all there is to see.

There are several ways to see the sights of Downtown, including horse and carriage tours, a riverboat ride on the Mississippi River and Backbeat Tours, a music-themed tour company … (read more)