When you lose someone, it’s nice to have a place to go where you can remember them, celebrate them, and, if possible, honor them.

In this spirit and in Stanley’s honor, as a foundation we, will be looking to build soccer parks (‘Stanley Ryder Soccer Parks’) in underserved areas. The idea of kids, friends, and families gathering, laughing, and playing soccer (his favorite thing) in a location built in honor of Stanley feels right. It is something he would have loved, and that makes us smile.

Our First Project

I was driving with my son in my hometown of El Paso, TX. El Paso is right on the border with the Mexican town of Juarez. There is a particular stretch named Puerto de Anapra on the Northeast side that is quite poor. There are no paved roads or streetlights, but at night, you can see the orange glow off the tires the residents burn for warmth and light. During the day you can see the neighborhoods built of cardboard-like cubicle-style roof-less apartments that use blankets and towels to line the dirt floors.  

And as you head East on Interstate 10, you get a very good view of it firsthand.  

‘Dad, what is that?’ Stanley asked me as we drove past it. I said: ‘That is Juarez, Mexico – it’s a pretty poor place. The people who live there don’t have much.’

He stared in silence as we drove past processing the realization that there are people in the world who don’t have basic life necessities, like decent housing, clean water, food…

What Stanley saw in Juarez made a big impact on him. It bothered him that people had to live like that. From time to time, he would ask questions about the people of Juarez, like: ‘Do the kids have playgrounds?’, ‘Do they have pools?, ‘Do they have fields?’.

When you lose a child, the grief is immense. But in my experience, things are made a little easier when you are proactive in doing something positive that helps another.

Our first project will be to build a soccer park for the people of Juarez, giving them a beautiful place to gather, laugh and play. Stanley would have loved this.

So on we go – we hope you will follow our journey! 

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Eric Wilson
Executive Director