Copyright ©2010. The Associated Press. Produced by NewsOK.com All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Growing up Ardmore
How one town became the perfect home for Jermaine Gresham
ARDMORE — Jermaine Gresham lived a normal childhood.
Multimedia
More Info
Oklahoma's Jermaine Gresham has a team-leading 11 touchdown receptions on 34 catches this season. The Sooners' sophomore tight end is a native of Ardmore.
by CHRIS LANDSBERGER, THE OKLAHOMAN
NewsOK Related Articles
Ask him, and he'll say nothing out of the ordinary.
Talk to those in his tight inner circle — mostly folks from the Oklahoma tight end's beloved hometown of Ardmore — and they'll recount an upbringing that was anything but typical. He slept most nights at houses that were not his own. He learned how to make a bed when he was in college because as a kid, he never had a bed. Clothes and shoes, backpacks and meals rarely came from blood relatives.
Gresham's parents provided him with love but had little else to give.
But like Gresham, there are details about his childhood that those closest to him refuse to divulge. The football coach, the substitute teacher and the school counselor know that the memories are still too fresh, still too painful for Gresham.
They will protect him at all costs.
Ironic, considering the Sooner sophomore hardly looks like he needs to be protected. He is a football force, entering the Fiesta Bowl with a team-leading 11 touchdown receptions despite having just 34 catches this season. In the mold of Tony Gonzales and Antonio Gates, the 6-foot-5, 263-pound Gresham is as big as a defensive end but as quick as a cover corner.
NFL types are already drooling.
Still, where he is and where he's going has everything to do with where he's been.
"The town took care of me,” said Gresham, who arrived in Phoenix with the Sooners on Wednesday. "I'm thankful for Ardmore.
"I'm blessed.”
• • •
Jermaine Gresham always felt a strong connection to Ardmore.
Walletta Gresham moved her family down Interstate 35 to Wichita Falls when her son was in elementary school. He played basketball there, even made some new friends, but it never felt like home. He was forever telling his mom that he wanted to go back to Ardmore.
"When we first came here ... he made himself sick,” Walletta said. "He said, ‘Mama, I just don't want to be here.'”
She decided to take him back to Ardmore for the summer to live with his father, Jerry Williamson.
That's when Gresham turned his sales pitch on his dad.
"Daddy, please, I don't want to go back,” he pleaded.
Walletta and Jerry finally relented, and Jermaine stayed in Ardmore.
"It bothered me at first,” said Walletta, a nurse's aide at a nursing home in Wichita Falls, "but he was with another parent, so I knew he was going to be all right.”
Not long after, Gresham first crossed paths with Steve Blankenship. The two were polar opposites, the lanky black kid and the bald white substitute teacher. They butted heads often.
"When I first met him, I couldn't stand him,” Blankenship said. "He was real loud in class, real braggadocios.”
Even though Blankenship was always on Gresham, something about the substitute struck the kid.
Blankenship cared.
"Always talked to me,” Gresham said. "Always asked how I was doing.”
Blankenship long had a heart for youngsters in Ardmore, volunteering at day camps and coaching at the YMCA. Gresham picked up on that spirit, asking him for help on homework and eventually confiding in him.
But Gresham didn't tell him everything. One day when Blankenship gave Gresham a ride home, he couldn't believe what he saw. He went home to wife, Sharie, in stunned disbelief.
"Where his dad lives,” Sharie said, "is not anything to write home about.”
The Blankenships refuse to provide many details beyond that, other than the fact that Gresham slept on a couch with no pillow.
Sports Photo Galleriesview all
Leave a comment
Prev
Follow
If you prefer your thoughts to appear in The Oklahoman, we encourage you to submit a letter to the editor.
Would you like to leave a comment?
Log in or sign up (it's free).