>> John Gilmore.
I'm the tight end for the New Orleans
Saints, Professional Football Player.
Just finished up my 10th season in NFL and I'm
co-founder of the Gilmore Henne Community Fund
which is located in Reading, Pennsylvania.
We're set up to revitalize parks and
recreational facilities in the area.
Really the whole idea came about just driving
around my hometown, seeing some of the parks
that I used to visit as a child, seeing that
the condition that they were in was pretty bad.
Drug paraphernalia, trash everywhere.
Pretty much abandoned.
Totally different than what it
was like when I was growing up.
So that kind of motivated me to
kind of spearhead this whole effort
and get going and that was about 3 years ago.
Well we're involved.
We're hands on.
I partnered with Chad Henne.
He's a Michigan graduate unfortunately but
we teamed up together and we're hands on.
You know it goes a long way when the community
sees us out there helping out, lending a hand.
You know we're not about just going
in there and delivering a park.
We try to engage the community
surrounding those parks and enable them
or empower them to fix their own.
So it's a pretty interesting
way and it's a great way to get
that community to take ownership of that park.
And we've had so much success in a short
amount of time because we rare involved.
We do go door-to-door soliciting sponsorships.
We do show up at somebody's door and say,
"Hey, can you help us build this part?
Can you help us do the demolition?
Can you help us do the excavating?"
It's not somebody showing
up and speaking for us.
So that goes a long way.
And we've built a lot of great
relationships doing that.
So you know you talk about sustainability
going forward, I think that's proof.
I think that's key.
My busy days believe it or not
are actually out of season.
You know the in season, again I
just finished up my 10th season.
So that's kind of become routine.
That's something that I know.
I wake up every day, 6:30 a.m., and I'm
checking out at 5 p.m. And it might be 1
or 2 phone calls concerning the fund.
Now off season's a little different.
You know when we have our fundraising
effort going on and we're gearing
up for our summertime projects, you
know my day could start at 8 a.m.
with a breakfast meeting
with a potential sponsor.
Then it will continue to go door to door with
local businesses asking them for their support.
Then I'll have maybe a neighborhood
meeting later on that afternoon.
Sometime in between then, you know I'm
meeting with a landscaper or an excavator.
Everything happens pretty
close together because Chad
and my schedules are pretty
filled July through January.
You know so when that February,
March, April hits you know it's --
we've got a short amount of time
to do a lot of things and...
[ Silence ]
You know, I hate to say this but you
know winning in all aspects you know,
winning on the football field, you know every
football player, that's why we play the game.
You know that feeling of victory.
You can't find that anywhere else.
That's a special sport for special people.
You know so that's irreplaceable but I've
found a similar feeling off the football field
and that's why I'm so passionate
about what we do.
And really it's setting very lofty goals
and challenging myself to meet those goals.
And I got to a certain point in my career
where I was somewhat fulfilled, so to say.
Emotionally, physically, football
wasn't as hard as it was 8 years ago.
You know, I was in my 6th, 7th
season and the challenge wasn't
as great as it was when I was a rookie.
So I needed something else to stimulate me.
So here along comes the Gilmore
Henne Community Fund.
What we're doing is we help revitalize
the parks and we don't just leave.
You know we don't just deliver these parks.
We implement programing after we're done.
We help maintain these parks
through the community.
They clean up the trash.
They help cut the grass.
They pick the weeds.
It's a lot of grassroots effort.
So it's very rewarding and challenging.
[ Silence ]
Professional sports isn't for everybody.
You know but I believe student athletes are
special people because of what they have
to take on while they're in school.
It's not easy going to class every day,
studying for finals then waking up at 6 a.m.
to go workout, coming back in the
afternoon to go you know practice.
Really a student athlete's schedule is a
little bit more hectic than a pro-athlete.
And with those demands of academics on
top of everything, you know it's tough.
So don't be afraid of failing.
You know when you leave --
when they leave school,
they're going to be competitors
because it's in them.
That's what they know.
And a lot of times I feel like I bump
into you know not just student
athletes but just students in general.
They go out in the real world
and they're intimidated.
And I think right now with what's
going on in our world right now,
this is definitely not the
time to be intimidated.
This is the time to go for whatever you want.
So I would definitely say
don't be afraid of losing.
Don't be afraid of failing.
[ Silence ]
I studied Commercial Recreation Management
here at Penn State which is pretty ironic
because that's what I'm -- I'm
actually utilizing my degree.
So I think that's kind of special.
You know I got drafted by the New Orleans
Saints in 2002 in the 6th round and I was only
with them for a short amount of time.
Jut training camp.
I was released by them in training camp and went
straight up to Chicago to the Chicago Bears.
I was with the Chicago Bears for 6 years
and then following that, the
Tampa Bay Buccaneers for 3.
Talk about full circle, this last year
I was back with the New Orleans Saints.
Hopefully that's where you
know I'd like to end my career.
I feel like I've got 2 more
solid, productive years in me.
You know they start to look at you different
in my profession once you
reach that 30-year age mark.
So yeah you know, that's kind
of my story in a nutshell.
You know I don't have you know -- I can't really
talk about anything specifically you know as far
as incidents that might have happened
to me as a child or anything growing up.
I had a pretty good support system you know?
I had 2 great parents.
You know I deal with kids right now that you
know back in the day they were struggling
to find one parent to look towards --
you know I mean they're having
trouble just finding any, you know?
There's always that missing father.
Now I'm across a lot of kids that
don't even have a mother in their life.
So I've been pretty fortunate in that
sense that I had 2 pretty good ones.
[ Silence ]
You know accountability is everything.
You know I learned that going through
the process of raising funds you know
for this Gilmore Henne Community Fund.
I tell -- I was telling these young students
yesterday, "You think big but you act small.
You know, baby steps and humility."
But accountability is huge.
We say, I've heard the term your
best ability is accountability.
So you know, when you're looking at
local business men, multimillionaires
and you're telling them exactly what you're
going to do and they give you funding to that,
there's a certain expectation
there that you have to live up to.
So I would say, you know my advice to them
would be you know continue to challenge yourself
so that you stay accountable to those
around you and those that support you,
those that back you because that's everything.
Your word is everything.
And that's the last thing you want to do
is break your word, no matter who it is.