The Ride

On July 9, 2026, what would have been my father Murphy C. Anderson Jr.’s 100th birthday, I’ll retrace the ride that shaped his youth — a two-day, 214-mile journey across North Carolina — to honor his life, his legacy, and those living with dementia.

My father’s story is one of imagination, talent, and endurance. A North Carolina-born artist whose science-fiction illustrations and comic-book work inspired generations, but his super-hero like resilience didn’t prevent dementia from stealing some of memories later in life. But long before that, he was a boy on a bicycle, riding the open roads of the South with a head full of stories and the freedom that only two wheels can give.