University of Tennessee Athletics
JASON FOUNDATION CLOSE TO FULMER'S HEART
June 20, 2007 | Football
June 20, 2007
By Gene Wojciechowski
ESPN.com
Jason Flatt was 16 when he stood alone in his bedroom, raised his father's .38 caliber, stainless steel Smith & Wesson to his head and pulled the trigger.
Jason Flatt committed suicide at the age of 16.
| Jason Foundation |
| For more information on the Jason Foundation, visit the organization's Web site at www.jasonfoundation.com. |
There was no suicide note. The only two things Clark Flatt found that July 1997 day in his suburban Nashville home were the crumpled, lifeless body of his youngest son and, as it turned out, a calling.
Flatt grieved, but he also had an awakening. A close friend had asked, "Do you really understand what happened?" and the truth was, Flatt didn't have a clue. Jason was the kind of kid you gushed about in the Goodpasture High School yearbook. Then one day he killed himself.
"I always thought it was something that happened to other people," Flatt said.
He began running the numbers -- that's what insurance executives do, right? -- and he was stunned by the frequency of teenage suicides. So on a kitchen table in the cramped file room of his insurance office, Flatt held the first meeting of his newly established Jason Foundation. Flatt wanted to teach people about teenage suicide, about the "silent epidemic," as he called it, that claims more than 100 Jasons each week.
But nonprofits usually fail in their first two years. So one of the teenage volunteers suggested they get a spokesperson, someone with a national presence.
"Sure," said Flatt, humoring the kid. "Who do you have in mind?"
"Phillip Fulmer," he said.
