Roger Harding

Roger Harding was born on April 20, 1948, in Grant, Alabama, to Eddie Lee and Willie Harding of Grant. He had two sisters, Faye Harding Manley and Janice Harding Smithey, and two brothers Jackie and Travis. Roger started playing basketball when he was in junior high at the Kate Duncan Smith DAR High School. His high school coach, Marshall County Sports Hall of Fame Charter Class Inductee, John Kitchens, remembers the game when Roger started playing and shooting well. According to Kitchens, "Roger was just a run-of-the-mill player in junior high when were playing in the County Junior High Championship game at Albertville. During the finals, Roger starting hitting everything he threw up. At the next timeout, Roger went to the sidelines and told me, "Coach, I don't know what's wrong! I can't miss!' Well, there was nothing wrong, in fact Roger kept on hitting and went on to become one of our best players." Kitchens also told that they got a professional floor refinisher from Lexington, Kentucky, who was a friend of Kentucky Head Basketball Coach Adolph Rupp, to come in and do the floors at the Doris White Pike Gymnasium at KDS. He came back to watch the Patriots play Scottsboro when the season started. According to Kitchens, "Roger tore the net up from 25 feet out that night and really put on a shooting show. The floor man came to me after the game and said that he had never seen anyone shoot that well and that he was going to tell Coach Rupp about him." Roger went on to an outstanding career at DAR. Roger was a 6-3 forward on Kitchens' 1964-65 team that won the Class A State Championship. As a junior on a team that included Marshall County Sports Hall of Fame Inductees Jimmy Keller, Garland Franks and Billy Ledbetter, Roger scored 18 points and collected 10 rebounds in the State Championship game with Moundville, which the Patriots won by a 55-35 score. In the 1965-66 season, Kitchens led the Patriots to a fifth consecutive trip to Tuscaloosa. A highlight of that season was when DAR defeated Arab native Paul Cooley's Pisgah Eagles, which went on to win the Class AAA State Championship. Roger led his team to the Area 16 and Region 8 Championships, making the All-Area and All-Region teams. KDS lost to Mars Hill in the State Tourney and even though the Patriots did not make the finals, Roger was selected to the First Team All-State Tournament Team. He was also chosen as Class A First Team All-State by the Birmingham Post-Herald. Teammate Leonard Corbin was chosen as Third Team All-State that year as well. The Patriots had earlier won the Marshall County Tournament that year, defeating the Albertville Aggies in the finals. Harding was a two-time All-Marshall County player and was selected to the team along with Hall of Fame inductees Wayne Wigley of Douglas and Tommy Wheeler of Boaz. Harding was not only an outstanding basketball player, but was an excellent student as well and president of the KDS Student Council. He was also a member of the Future Business Leaders of America and the Future Farmers of America. Following high school, Roger signed a scholarship to play basketball for Hall of Fame Charter Class Inductee Emmett Plunkett at Snead State Junior College, now Snead State Community College, in Boaz. The speaker at the Parsons' Basketball Banquet was none other than Head Coach Adolph Rupp of the Kentucky Wildcats. After his playing days at Snead, Roger played independent basketball on a team that was undefeated and won the Guntersville Slow Break Basketball League Championship. This team included many of his DAR teammates. Roger went to work with South Central Bell, now AT&T, and worked there his entire adult life before retiring with over 30 years of service. He also took time to mentor many young aspiring basketball players in the art of shooting. Hall of Fame Board of Directors member Jimmy Bradshaw, said, "Roger had a great ability to elevate and hang in the air while shooting the jump shot. He taught a lot of other young boys to shoot that way." Roger married his high school sweetheart Pat Jimerson. The Hardings had three children, Patrick, Bo and Nicole. Patrick and Bo followed their Dad's footsteps and were outstanding basketball players at KDS. Both went into teaching and coaching as a profession. Patrick is married to Misty Hayes, an outstanding volleyball player at Douglas High School, and the daughter of Marshall County Sports Hall of Fame Inductee, Richard Hayes. The couple has two boys, Dillon and Dane. It appears that both of these boys are following in the footsteps of their parents and grandparents. Nicole also has two children, Callie and Noah. Sadly, Roger passed away in 1997 and Pat passed away in 2004.