Larry Hall always asks himself the same question when he gets to the Midland Legacy fieldhouse at 4:00 a.m. and peers up at the sign above the entrance.
“It’s my five minutes of fame every morning,” Hall said. “It’s a feeling where you ask yourself, ‘Did I really deserve it?’”
No one is there to answer that question for him as he stands in the dark. The scalding West Texas sun hasn’t even surfaced. There’s not a coach in sight, and the players presumably haven’t woken up yet. So the 82-year-old Hall is left to ponder if he truly earned this honor as he unlocks the door with the key Legacy head coach Clint Hartman gave him.
He’s the first team member to arrive, and he’ll surely be the last to leave that night.
“Whenever this is all said and done, he’s going to have been in that fieldhouse more than anyone has ever been in their life,” Hartman said.
Hall hasn’t been paid a dime in the three decades he has volunteered for the Midland Legacy (formerly Midland Lee) program. He’s worked for five different head coaches, seen the first three-peat state championship run from 1998–2000 and three-straight losing seasons from 2014–16. He’s shown up every day no matter what the team’s record was. He’s loyal to the program.
That’s why he’s walking in the door of the Larry Hall Fieldhouse at 4:00 a.m. to do laundry.
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