KANNAPOLIS — Sunday’s memorial service for racing giant Dale Earnhardt went off smoothly, but not without hundreds of hours of planning, preparation and volunteer work that continued well after the last fan had left Fieldcrest Cannon Stadium.
The stadium hosted around 4,500 fans, friends and Earnhardt family members, stadium officials estimated. But the service was beamed out to countless others on local and national television, so Kannapolis wanted to put on its best face when it remembered its hometown hero.
And that’s not easy with just a few days’ notice. City leaders originally planned to hold the service in 1,900-seat A.L. Brown High School auditorium, but changed the location Tuesday, when it became apparent fans from Kannapolis and elsewhere would easily overflow the room.
From then until Sunday, the effort was continuous for many in the city staff. Jennifer Woodford, the city’s public information officer, coordinated the service, and Vicky Morris, executive office assistant at the city offices, recruited volunteers and made many of the preparations herself.
“I think everyone felt it really was a privilege and an honor,” City Manager David Hales said.
Nearly 50 volunteers recruited from city staff, their families and friends joined forces with more than 100 law enforcement officers and a host of businesses to carry off the memorial service. The preparations were fast and furious, with changes and new wrinkles daily, Woodford said.
“We really just handled everything as it came up,” she said. “What was wonderful to me is that everybody came on board and did everything they could to make it happen.”
That included everything from fielding telephone calls at the city offices from media outlets including CNN and ESPN, People and Time magazines, to making sure the people who spoke on Sunday had places to sit and everyone in the stadium had a candle to light.
The city bought 5,000 candles from a local store and ordered 15 books for fans to leave their memories of Earnhardt in writing. And the programs for the service were still being dried with blow driers on Sunday morning, Woodford said.
Many of the materials used in the service were borrowed. A couple who attend church with Morris provided a large black flag bearing Earnhardt’s No. 3 and the name of his sponsor, Goodwrench, and South Rowan High School loaned the city black and red flags, Earnhardt’s and the school’s colors.
Morris even got her son involved. He designed a No. 3 pattern on their home computer and she bought fabric at a department store to make big white threes they then taped onto the flags, presented by South Rowan High band members who ended up standing with the flags during the service because the wind would have blown them down.
“It seemed like every 15 minutes we were changing something, and everybody adapted,” Morris said. “My poor husband, he had to keep the household going while I was working.”
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