Greater Louisville Pride Foundation announces Hometown Heroes 2024 class, 8 to get banners

Eight people with Louisville ties are set to receive Hometown Hero banners after they were named to the program's class of 2024, the Greater Louisville Pride Foundation announced Tuesday.

The honorees include a Grammy Award winner, an NBA champion and the teachers who inspired the writers of the "Happy Birthday" song. The foundation said it received 44 nominations for the 2024 class.

“This enthusiastic response of so many outstanding nominations once again underscores thecommunity’s desire to show pride in Louisville by recognizing the city’s most famous sons and daughters,” Mike Sheehy, the foundation's president said in a statement.

Here is the class of 2024:

Stephen Ellis Garrett Jr.

Known in the music industry as Static Major, the Louisville native, was a prominent singer, songwriter and record producer in the 90s and 2000s. Garrett wrote songs for Aaliyah, Ginuwine, Pretty Ricky, and Destiny’s Child, while also starring in the Louisville-based R&B trio Playa, known for the song "Cheers 2 U."

He co-wrote and was featured on Lil Wayne's "Lollipop," which won the 2009 Best Rap Song Grammy. Garrett died unexpectedly in 2008. He was 33.

In 2021, Louisville natives Jack Harlow and Bryson Tiller honored Garrett in the song "Luv is Dro."

Dr. Allan Lansing

A pioneering surgeon, Lansing performed the first kidney transplant in Louisville and mastered heart procedures that were once only available out of state. He founded the heart and vascular institute at Norton Audubon Hospital and established Bellarmine University's School of Nursing, which is now named after him.

Lansing died at the age of 92 in 2022.

Rajon Rondo

A star player at Eastern High School and the University of Kentucky, Rondo went on to have a long professional career, winning championships with the Boston Celtics in 2008 and the Los Angeles Lakers in 2020. In 2011, he founded the Rajon Rondo Foundation, which funds educational programs for students in Louisville.

Since 2007, he has annually hosted Camp Rondo, a summer youth basketball camp.

Howard Schnellenberger

The former University of Louisville head football coach helped build a winning program. The Cardinals won multiple bowl games under Schnellenberger, who had previously led the University of Miami to a national championship.

Schnellenberger influenced U of L leaders to build a new football stadium. The football complex inside the stadium is named after him.

Schnellenberger died in 2021 at the age of 87.

More: A Kentucky legend: Former Louisville football coach Howard Schnellenberger dies

Mildred and Patty Hill

"Happy Birthday to You" has its roots in Louisville. The Hills wrote "Good Morning to All," a song that helped form the melody of the traditional birthday tune.

Since it was published in 1893, "Happy Birthday to You," has been rewritten in several languages, including Spanish, German, French, Italian, Mandarin Chinese and Japanese.

John Y. Brown Jr. and Eleanor "Ellie" Brown

Kentucky's governor from 1979 to 1983, John Y. Brown Jr. is also known for building Kentucky Fried Chicken into an international brand. In Louisville, Brown and his first wife, Eleanor, helped fund the Actor's Theatre, Downtown YMCA, the Kentucky Center for the Performing Arts and the Muhammad Ali Center.

More: John Y. Brown Jr., dashing KFC millionaire who became Kentucky governor, dies

In a statement Tuesday, the foundation said it "limited" selections for 2024 to direct some focus on repairing some of the existing banners, including those of Muhammad Ali, Colonel Harlan Sanders, Pee Wee Reese, Judge Louis Brandeis and Denny Crum. The foundation launched "Hometown Heroes 2.0" in 2022 after the original program ended five years earlier.

Sheehy said the foundation has been working with property owners to determine whether some banners should be repaired or retired.

“In some cases, we are retiring some banners to free up previously used building walls from the original program to make space for a new Hometown Heroes 2.0 honoree,” Sheehy said the statement.

The foundation did not say where the new banners would hang, but mentioned it is continuing to secure funding and find places for the previously approved banners of John Asher, Lionel Hampton, Justin Thomas and Wes Unseld. The foundation is also working to fund and place banners honoring Julius Friedman and "Louisville Rocks."

Reach reporter Leo Bertucci at lbertucci@gannett.com or @leober2chee on X, formerly known as Twitter

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Hometown Hero foundation names Class of 2024