Fundraiser

Campaign Story

Make A Memory is a fundraising and educational initiative started by twin brothers Blake and Cade Byer. We started this initiative due to our grandparents who battled with Alzheimer’s disease. 

In 2011, we saw our great-grandfather, Ralph “Andy” Anderson, enter his battle with Alzheimer’s disease. As a young child, we had never seen such a strong man. He was a Master Sergeant in the Marines who fought in the Korean War. He was the man who gave us our first baseball gloves and encouraged us to play America’s favorite past-time just like he did. So when he started to have memory problems, it left a profound impact on us. We learned at the young age of 7 that disease does not discriminate, no matter how strong you are. More recently, in 2018, we saw our grandfather, Ken Atkinson, fight with Alzheimer’s disease. After he passed in August 2019, we did research about AD and began to understand his symptoms. Now we understand the early signs of the disease. First, he became irritable, he misplaced things, and finally became confused. It was very sad, as his condition quickly deteriorated. We’ll never forget his laughter, love, and insatiable appetite for knowledge (and poppy seed muffins). 

After seeing our grandparents struggle with Alzheimer’s disease, we were prompted to start a fundraiser, website, and social media page in their memory. It’s not just for them, however. We want to raise money to accelerate the development of a cure so that no family has to struggle with Alzheimer’s or other dementias. 

That next step is an unconventional place: the track. In our free time, we love to run. Our senior track season, we decided, we won’t just be running for ourselves. Throughout the next two months, we will be racing 800 meters, 1500m, and 3000m races. You could say we are “racing for a cure.” We are racing for grandpa Andy, Ken, and all those affected by Alzheimer’s disease. 

Please help our initiative by donating to the Fisher Center for Alzheimer’s Research Foundation. 

Thank you,

Blake and Cade Byer

Please visit our website: makeamemoryalz.org

Please visit our Instagram: @makeamemory.alz

Click the link or follow our social media page to learn more about ourselves, our grandparents, our racing schedule, and Alzheimer’s disease.