Bicyclists on long journeys don’t just ride, but also build while fundraising by the mile
Fuller Center/Courtesy image
Annually, volunteers in bright orange T-shirts bicycle cross-country on one north-south route, one east-west. Last week, 20 of them visited Aspen during a 10-week adventure covering 3,919 miles through California forests and mountains, Utah and Arizona high desert, camping next to the Grand Canyon’s Jacob Lake.
These Fuller Center for Housing volunteers started May 27 in La Jolla, California. Averaging more than 50 miles daily, they got to the Roaring Fork Valley, where more volunteers joined the ride to help raise funds for the nonprofit created by Habitat for Humanity’s founder, Millard Fuller.
The final destination is postcard pretty Wilmington on North Carolina’s coast. Along the way, the cyclists are hosted by houses of worship and they build or rehab homes and RVs for low-income residents.
Aspen’s Christ Episcopal Church hosted them last week, greeting the cyclists with mounds of oranges, bananas, hot coffee, ice water and gallons of green Gatorade.
Fuller Center cyclists raise funds (via dollars per mile pledged by friends, family and acquaintances) for the charity named after Fuller, a Presidential Medal of Freedom honoree.
On their trips, volunteers stop to repair or rebuild housing for people in grim situations. Before reaching Roaring Fork, they rehabbed the home of an elderly history buff who blew off both his hands with an explosive during a Civil War re-enactment. His deck was collapsed, his home jammed with junk he no longer wanted, roof and wall repairs were needed.
“While we worked, neighbors came out to watch then joined in, helping clear debris and fix things. It’s great to see a community bond,” said Neil Mullikin, whose Fuller job title is “adventure coordinator.”
Charity Navigator gives the Fuller Center its highest four star rating. Mullikin said only 3 percent or less of Fuller funds is spent on bike ride expenses. Since the first ride in 2008, more than 1,600 Adventure cyclists raised more than $4 million for housing for those in need. One of Fuller’s 95 chapters scattered across America vets recipients then invites volunteers to work on a house or RV.
Mullikin plans trips to include home-building projects and pinpoints highway rest room stops dotting highways.
So far, the riders have only spotted bears or bobcats from a safe distance. They’ve had to hunker down with nowhere to hide from thunderstorms or hail. Riders’ ages have ranged from college kids to a 92 year old who supplied his own van and driver so he could take rest breaks without delaying others.
A van with a pit crew follows along with Fuller volunteers to help with bike repairs and minor injuries. Rider Marty Merkt hit a pothole that catapulted him across the handlebars into the asphalt. His injured arm was treated in Carbondale, and he was back on his bike minutes later. The pit crew also helps repair tire punctures caused by “goatheads” — small, rock-hard thorn clusters.
Some houses of worship that host the riders at night don’t have showers. Staying clean can be a challenge.
The idea of a cold shower was so alluring that Dave Perry dunked himself fully clothed in a concrete Carbondale irrigation tube filled with fresh snowmelt.
“The water was about 30 degrees,” said Perry. “I screamed and jumped out.”
The grit and the dust seem part of the inspiration. Mullikin left a high-paying corporate job to work for Americus, Georgia-based Fuller. In that way, he followed the founder’s trajectory.
Born into poverty, selling chickens and fish bait as a child, Fuller became a millionaire after launching a direct mail business with University of Alabama Law classmate and Southern Poverty Law Center founder Morris Dees.
In the 1960s, Fuller left the corporate world to help a Baptist theologian who had founded an Americus fruit orchard and pecan farm where Blacks and whites worked and ate meals together and worship services were integrated. In the turbulent 1960s, the workers were constantly threatened by racists and the farm’s small store burned. Yet Fuller was able to convince some wealthy merchants to donate supplies for workers’ housing.
In the 1970s, Fuller founded Habitat. Former President Jimmy Carter joined, making it world famous.
A Fuller Center video presents Fuller President David Snell describing what led to a split between Fuller and Habitat. Fuller loved the decentralized, personal approach of local chapters vetting potential homeowners. His style began to clash with Habitat’s board. Fuller was impatient with brand protection discussions and business plans. He understood corporate culture and had thrived in it but began rebel against its conventions. He once jumped onto a conference room table to speak when he thought the board’s attention was wandering.
The board fired him in 2004.
The Nonprofit Times investigated allegations by two female staffers that Fuller engaged in unwanted kissing and banter. One told the NT that Fuller offended her by using the word “adultery” in her presence because she considers it a curse word. Another felt uneasy when he told her she had “beautiful eyes” and “smooth skin.”
At the time, Carter told reporters he thought Fuller may not realize that what men in their generation thought of as gallantries could seem weird or inappropriate to female professionals in 2004.
Fuller founded the Fuller Center for Housing in 2005. That November, Hurricane Katrina destroyed New Orleans impoverished Ninth Ward and turned coastal Mississippi homes to rubble. Fuller’s new organization built homes in Shreveport and grew to be an international builder with trips to El Salvador, Nepal and Armenia.
Fuller built homes in what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo as a Christian missionary, but Snell welcomes volunteers of all faiths: “We invite everyone with a good heart and willing hands.”
Anyone can go onto the Fuller website to find a bike trip or an overseas trip to join or propose a journey. The Aspen visitors insisted the adventures are fun.
Valerie Foland joined the group from Tucson, Arizona. She recently realized she hated her job, quit and found a new job she loved. She had about three weeks before the new job.
“I decided to join this bike ride and it’s been the perfect way to celebrate,” she said.
To reach Lynda Edwards, email her at ledwards@aspentimes.com.
