Ceremony for the renaming of a road in Murfreesboro - Road named after NFL Player Jerry Anderson.

Jul 30, 2014 at 02:05 pm by bryan


City officials will gather to dedicate a section of Community Circle in the Kimbro Woods subdivision in honor of the late Jerry Anderson who died while saving the lives of two drowning children in the Stones River in 1989. The event is this Friday, August 1, 2014 - 2:00 p.m.

The Murfreesboro City Council renamed the existing east-west segment of Community Circle to Jerry Anderson Drive during the May 15, 2014 council meeting.  Jerry Anderson, who played football for the University of Oklahoma and in the National Football League (NFL) for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Cincinnati Bengals, lost his life while saving the lives of two young boys he did not know on May 27, 1989. Anderson was only 35 when he drowned. The street named after him is only a few miles from where he drowned.  

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Four years before Anderson saved the drowning boys, he rescued trapped motorist who were in raging flood-waters in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The event in Oklahoma occurred on on May 27, 1985. Exactly four years later on May 27, 1989, he rescued the two young boys who were drowning in the Stones River near Riverdale High School.

City Councilman Ron Washington told WGNS, "Jerry was a strong influence in my life as he took me under his wings just like he did other young boys that idolized him as a brother and athlete while at Central High School." 

More on Anderson:

In October of 1989, his story was aired on the popular reality TV show “Rescue 911.”

The road named in his honor is three miles away from the exact point of where Anderson died. 

Watch a video from the show “Rescue 911”

Jerry Anderson Hero Part 1

Jerry Anderson Hero Part 2

Location of event: 

At the temporary turnaround / cul-de-sac at the end of Community Circle (soon to be named Jerry Anderson Drive.)

 

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