Rick Alspa of Hoffman Estates may be the music pack rat’s best friend.
If you’re looking to get rid of records, CDs or musical instruments, Alspa will take them off your hands.
For the last several months, Alspa has traipsed around the northwest suburbs, seeking donations for the 19th annual Mammoth Music and Record Mart, a sale of new and used recorded music and electronic equipment to benefit the Les Turner ALS Foundation.
It is a personal mission for Alspa.
“My wife was diagnosed with ALS two years ago,” said Alspa, 52. “After she was diagnosed, we started receiving information about different fundraisers.”
At last count, he had personally corralled more than 9,000 items for the 11-day sale. The annual event, which offers about 400,000 items for sale, is Sept. 26-Oct. 6 under a tent in the parking lot at the Old Orchard Shopping Center in Skokie.
“For this season, . . . he’s done five or six different things rather than just one thing (to help with the collection),” said Wendy Abrams, the foundation’s executive director. “That’s what makes him unique. He’s one volunteer who’s been motivated to really get involved with the collection.”
ALS, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, is commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. It is a degenerative disease that leads to impaired speaking, swallowing and breathing and muscle weakness. There’s no cure. The average age of onset is about 50, and most patients survive for two to five years after diagnosis.
The music sale especially appealed to Alspa because, he said, he liked its approach. “It’s a fundraiser in which you’re not asking people just for money,” he said.
So he got started, talking up the sale, promoting it within his community. “I just started asking my neighbors, friends at church and family members,” he said. “Everybody always had something sitting around (to donate). I had such success with asking, and stuff just started coming in.” He has collected more than 7,000 records, 1,300 cassette tapes, 650 CDs and 110 personal stereos, in addition to eight TVs, 18 instruments and 11 computers.
He said his overwhelming success might be largely due to the fact that “so many people in the area knew my wife.”
Georgia Alspa, Rick’s wife of 20 years, was 48 when she was diagnosed with ALS. She had been “in great health” all through her 24 years as a 6th-grade teacher, for six years at Cardinal Drive School in Rolling Meadows and 18 years at Thomas Jefferson Elementary School in Hoffman Estates.
Her symptoms began with balance problems. “She couldn’t ride a bike anymore. They thought it was stress,” he said. Then her voice began to weaken. It wasn’t until Georgia visited Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood that doctors discovered she had ALS.
Eventually, the couple went to the ALS clinic at Northwestern University Medical School in Chicago, which treats people and does research. Georgia visits the clinic every three months, where her health is monitored and she receives counsel on how to deal with the symptoms of ALS.
But treatment is limited and there is no cure. “All they can do is inform us of the drugs that are coming out now,” Rick said.
Rick Alspa said his wife has difficulty swallowing and takes all liquids and foods through a feeding tube. She can walk, he said, “but she gets very tired and very weak.”
Georgia Alspa is especially grateful for her husband’s help. “He educates (people) about what ALS is and tells them how they can help with the research. We have so many (friends) out here who had never heard of it,” she said.
She also has praise for the ALS Foundation. “They’ve been very helpful with questions I have and when I have a problem with physical limitations,” she said.
A human resources specialist for United Airlines, Rick took a voluntary furlough from his job about two years ago, a move he made so he can care for his wife. “She really does need someone full time because she is so extremely weak,” he said. “I’m very glad to be at home with Georgia.”
Not only did his company support his career decision, but his coworkers pitched in to help make his donation drive for the music mart a success. “I went to my friends at United, and they said they had lots of records,” he said. “United came through with all kinds of stuff.”
One of those who helped was Mary Ann Smalley of Elmhurst, an administrative support worker. “The more people we talked to, the more people wanted to get involved,” Smalley said. “Everybody was so cooperative. I think it’s something we could do probably every year.”
Smalley said she believes Rick Alspa’s zealous efforts have helped him and his wife cope with ALS. “It was great for him,” she said. “It was a big help to him, to feel that he and his wife were doing something.”
Word spread from United to other O’Hare Airport employees, including a woman who works at a travel agency who offered to donate three computers, Alspa said.
Alspa also received help from the two churches he and his wife are involved with: Willow Creek Community Church in South Barrington and St. John’s United Church of Christ in Palatine. Both have spread the word about ALS and the music mart, he said.
The Alspas’ faith plays an important role in how they cope with ALS. “God’s been good to me,” said Rick Alspa. “I think that’s very important. Even though this devastating thing has happened to us, God is with us. He has provided.”
Alspa also approached local businesses and the Hoffman Estates police and fire departments, and they responded by distributing fliers and serving as dropoff points. He called the local cable television company, which agreed to do a public service announcement about the mart. “I’ve done a lot of things I’ve never done before, but I’m so enthused,” Alspa said. “The whole idea is my dear wife has this terrible disease and here was something I could do.”
“We call him the one-man crusade out in Hoffman Estates,” said Amy Peiken, the music mart’s director. “He will talk to anyone who will stand still and listen to him about the event.”
Peiken said a corps of about 50 volunteers works on setting up the music mart, sorting and pricing. The items–which include records, cassettes, videotapes, compact discs, musical instruments, sheet and book music, computer software and audio and video equipment–are warehoused in a 23,000-square-foot space in Skokie donated for the mart’s year-round use by Old Orchard Shopping Center.
Because the music mart’s inventory is culled from communities all over the Chicago area, there are 132 dropoff sites, including banks, theaters, fire departments, health clubs and record stores. Most dropoff locations close Aug. 31; others remain open year-round.
Alspa has gotten involved in this aspect of the operation too. “He set up his wife’s parents’ farm (in Algonquin) as a storage location,” Peiken said. “He’s gone above and beyond what we’ve seen people doing.”
The mart, which is held at the corner of Golf Road and Skokie Boulevard, has attracted crowds of about 16,000 in past years. Peiken said the foundation hopes to exceed last year’s fundraising total of $280,000. Proceeds are used for ALS research and patient services.
Fundraising is the most effective weapon against ALS, the foundation’s Abrams said, adding that Alspa’s help has been greatly appreciated.
“Since his wife’s diagnosis, this is the one way he feels he can help,” she said.
“It all kind of works together,” said Georgia Alspa, who said she feels pretty good despite her illness. “The music mart helps the foundation, and the foundation helps the (Northwestern) clinic.”
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For more information about the Mammoth Music and Record Mart, call 847-674-6278.
