Both Wesley Fowler (left) and brother Randy suffered from a disease called dilated cardiomyopathy. It cost them their hearts, but thanks to organ donors, they have survived.

Geoff Calkins has been chronicling Memphis and Memphis sports for more than two decades. He is host of “The Geoff Calkins Show” from 9-11 a.m. M-F on 92.9 FM. Calkins has been named the best sports columnist in the country five times by the Associated Press sports editors, but still figures his best columns are about the people who make Memphis what it is.

As he lay in his hospital bed, waiting for a heart transplant, Randy Fowler wrestled with a question: Is it OK to pray for a new heart?

“For me to get a new heart, someone had to die,” he said. “How do I pray for that?”

Fowler met with a preacher. The preacher reminded him that tragedies happen.

“So I would pray every night that if someone died, they would be a donor, and that if it were God’s will, that heart would find its way to me,” Fowler said.

Not long after, a heart became available.

Fowler — a Tennessee fan — played “Rocky Top” on a musical keychain as he was wheeled into the operating room. That was 27 years ago.

“I’m still going,” said Fowler, 58. “We beat the odds.”

Wait, we?

Yes.

“My brother, Wesley, got his first heart two years later,” Randy said. 

“He got another heart in 2020.”

Meaning, between them, the Fowler brothers of Covington, Tennessee, have lived more than half a century because three Tennesseans chose to be donors. So happy National Donor Day, everyone! What, you thought it was just Valentine’s?

“What better way to celebrate Valentine’s Day than by showing your heart and registering to become a donor,” said Kim Van Frank, executive director of the Mid-South Transplant Foundation.

Or, as Randy put it: “God wants your soul, not your organs.”

The Fowler brothers believe they can speak with some authority on this topic. When Wesley got his heart in 1999, they became just the second set of brothers to get heart transplants.

“We have a disease called dilated cardiomyopathy,” Randy said. “It’s genetic. My mother died of it at 36. My older brother died of it at 36, too. You remember that Boston Celtics basketball player who died of a heart attack?

Reggie Lewis?

“That’s what he had.”

By 1997, Randy’s heart had expanded so dramatically it didn’t leave room in his chest cavity to breathe.

“When I checked into Vanderbilt hospital, I wasn’t checking out unless I got a new heart,” he said. “By the time they put me under, I was totally at peace. When I woke up, it felt like the best nap I’d ever had. I could finally take a breath. It gave me my life back.”

Two years later, Wesley found himself in a similar state.

“I told God that if I lived, I would keep singing gospel music as long as I could,” he said.

Wesley belongs to a gospel quarter called “Crossing Jordan.”

Sure enough, he is still singing away.

But not just singing. Since he got his new heart, Wesley, now 60, has 1) jumped from a plane with a parachute, 2) become an experienced scuba diver, 3) earned a degree from the University of Memphis and 4) watched his kids grow up.

Randy and Wesley will both tell you No. 4 is the one that really matters. Randy’s daughter, Olivia, administers heart echocardiograms at Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare — and teaches new students how it’s done.

“It makes me proud,” Randy says. “I remember that I used to say I just wanted to see her finish elementary school.”

And, yes, for these miraculous things to happen, someone had to die. Both Randy and Wesley have been in touch with the families of their donors.

“You can write letters,” Randy said. “At first, there are no names. But we exchanged letters and I finally got a name and number. One day, I called her. You talk about getting chills. I told her, ‘Ma’am, I’m the guy that received your son’s heart.’ She started crying and I started crying, and we talked about an hour.”

During the course of the conversation, the mother asked Randy if he wanted to know how her son died.

“She actually said, ‘Do you really want to know this?’” Randy said. 

“Right then, I knew it was bad. She told me that he shot himself. And that was very sad. But you know what else? That man ended up saving five lives.”

Wesley is still in touch with the parents of his first donor. They became good friends.

“You can’t really explain the connection,” he said. “Without their son, I wouldn’t be here.”

Which is the point of National Donor Day, really. To give more people a chance to stick around. According to the U.S Department of Health & Human Services, there were more than 46,000 organ transplants in 2023. That’s a lot of scuba diving, parachute jumping, singing and child-raising. That’s a lot of lives being saved.

So think about becoming a donor, if you haven’t already done so. To register or get more information, go to MidSouthTransplant.org. Or when you sign up for your driver’s license, check the box that says you want to be an organ donor.

“You can tell by looking at your license if you’ve done it,” said Van Frank. “You should see a little red heart.”

March is National Kidney Month, a time to spread awareness about kidney health and kidney disease and learn what you can do to support it. One Mid-South family exemplifies a unique and inspirational story regarding organ and tissue donation.

“Full circle moment for me. Not only me and my mom having a kidney transplant, but my brother being a donor, and my dad being my living donor,” ARTavius Veasey said. “Organ donation and transplantation are all in my family.”

ARTavius was diagnosed with kidney disease at the age of three; 17 years ago, he was blessed with a kidney transplant from his father.

“I can’t even describe the day; it was just full of excitement,” Veasey said. “It’s like now my life gets to start.”

ARTavius and his mom Tremetrius Barnes are both kidney recipients. Tremetrius received a kidney from a deceased donor 24 years ago. Watching her son’s battle was all too familiar.

“We went through the journey; it wasn’t so bad because I went through it,” Barnes said. “I was just trying to tell him that we can do this, we can go through it, and we don’t have to worry about what people say or whatever. That he will be okay.”

Their kidney story doesn’t end there. Barnes’ youngest son was 24 years old when he died in a car accident. A gesture he did before his death helped save and enhance the lives of 67 people.

“I didn’t ask him to do it,” Barnes said. “He said Mom, someone helped you and my brother so I would want to be on the list for if anything happened to me I can help somebody else.”

As a donor family, living donor, and kidney transplant recipients, this family knows donation first-hand and has lived it from all sides.

“Donate, sign that paper, MidSouthTransplant.org. If you do that, look at us. We are a family and a donated family,” Barnes said. “Just do it.”

Veasey published a book to walk readers through his journey, titled Becoming A Living Testimony: My Journey Through Kidney Disease and How It Blessed My Life. Veasey also serves as the Digital Communications Coordinator at Mid-South Transplant Foundation.

Two young men who lost their lives in 2020 after a deadly car crash were honored Friday night for saving the lives of several strangers through organ donation. In 2020, T.J. Smith, his younger brother Tyronzen Smith, and another person were killed in a car crash.

Tyronzen was a student at Covington High School at the time. T.J. was a standout running back for Covington High from 2013 to 2016. Davis says Tyronzen is his hero.

”I had a double lung transplant that I got from Tyronzen, aka ‘Run Run’ is what everybody calls him, really, so I’m really glad to be here,” Davis said. “If it weren’t for him, I wouldn’t be here.”

For Tyronzen’s mother, Charmin Smith, it was a beautiful moment for her to see her son and stepson honored and to see how many lives they saved.

”Just the fact that they’re taking the time to acknowledge them, even though they died in that tragedy, just acknowledging them is wonderful,” Smith said.

Mary Beck with Mid-South Transplant Foundation says even after their tragedy, T.J. and Tyronzen’s families helped save lives.

”They weren’t registered donors,” Beck said. “But the parents decided, they knew exactly what they needed to do to give this gift of life to other people. They might’ve been going through something very difficult, but they wanted other people to have the chance to live.”

Mid-South Transplant Foundation says there are 4,00 people around the Mid-South in need of organ donation.

February is American Heart Month, and for many heart transplant recipients, it’s a time for gratitude and awareness.

Vera Milam Johnson had a heart transplant in 2011 at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Since then, she has been spreading the message about the importance of heart health and being an organ donor.

ABC 24’s Elvis Hardwick spoke to Johnson about what she’s been through, what’s next, and why the message is so important.

According to Mid-South Transplant Foundation, 13,000 adults and children are awaiting organ transplants in the U.S. right now, and more than 4,000 of those are in the Mid-South.

Know the symptoms of a heart attack:

• Chest discomfort
• Discomfort in the upper body
• Shortness of breath
• Possible signs: breaking out in a cold sweat, nausea, lightheadedness

To keep your heart healthy, it’s best to learn to manage stress levels, get moving, and take up healthy eating habits.

Naoshia Butler received a heart transplant on January 30, 2017. Butler’s diagnosis of congestive heart failure wasn’t known until after giving birth to her son. She woke up one night and recognized instantly that something was wrong. that’s when she asked her son’s father to take her to the ER.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but I know something is not right, and I need to go to the hospital,” Butler said.

The ER nurse told her that she had a heart attack, her heart was only functioning at 15%, and she needed a heart transplant.

“Okay, let me call my momma to let her know that I’m not coming home today. I’m so goofy that I didn’t take it seriously, not knowing that I would be in the hospital for nine months.” Butler said once getting the news from the doctor.

During the time in the hospital, Butler remembers how she missed out a lot with her newborn due to her illness and being in the hospital.

“The average mom gets to hold their baby… I didn’t get to do any of that. I miss that whole phase because I was sick.”

Being such a strong believer in God and knowing that He had her back, Butler didn’t allow the status of her health to get her down.

“While I was in the hospital, I went back to school. I did my studies on my laptop and turned in my homework.”

Still to this day, Butler says it takes time to adjust to having the transplant, and she sometimes walks slowly but is grateful for the opportunity to live again because, without the gracious heart donor, she could have been still sick or worse, passed on.

According to Mid-South Transplant Foundation, 13,000 adults and children are awaiting organ transplants in the U.S. right now, and more than 4,000 of those are in the Mid-South.

Two families have been united through a selfless act that happened half a century ago. Watching the Fracchias and the Teagues interact, one may think the families have been friends for years. But the small gathering at one of their homes in Germantown Tuesday was only the second time they met in person.

The first time was a couple of weeks ago.

“It was like we had conversations previously. It just felt like family,” Nancy Leggett, daughter of Annie Teague, said.

Their paths crossed long before then, spanning back 50 years. Days before her sudden death, Annie Teague told her family she wanted to be an organ donor. August 28, 1970, was a tragic day for the four children she left behind.

“She was the good Samaritan,” Teague’s son James said. “We know she made the right decision.”

The difficult decision was to let her kidney go to a mother of three even younger children who desperately needed one.

“Without knowing these kids, she was kind of our angel,” Ray Fracchia said about Annie Teague.

Mary Fracchia was the third kidney transplant recipient in Memphis. The operation performed by Dr. Louis Britt helped the Fracchia children spend 13 more years with their mother. After being encouraged by his father, Steve Fracchia combed through newspapers and Facebook to find the family of the woman who they called their angel. The families connected and reunited for the first time, almost to the day their lives changed forever.

“My dad has been very adamant to say, ‘Be sure that this family knows that they totally changed the trajectory of our family history’,” Steve Fracchia said.

“Him reaching out to us, it was a blessing,” Leggett said about Fracchia’s mission to unite the two families.

Over the years, the Fracchia’s have become advocates for organ donation.

“We’ll always be grateful, and that’s an opportunity for everyone who can check a little box and become an organ donor. There’s such a contribution to be made,” Liz Breen, daughter of Mary Fracchia, said.

The Teague’s have followed in their mother’s footsteps.

“As a family, we’re all organ donors. So I think that says it all,” Leggett said.

Dr. Louis Britt, the physician who performed the kidney transplant, went on to found the Mid-South Transplant Foundation.