Why this Nashville man is selling hats from Michael Jackson, Slash and Alice Cooper

He has visited the homes of three U.S. presidents and chatted many times with a fourth — Ronald Reagan — in Reagan's California office.

Chaz Corzine has been a passenger in race cars being whipped around tracks by driver legend Mario Andretti. He knows U2's Bono.

These are the kinds of famous folks you meet when you've represented two iconic Christian music stars — Amy Grant and Michael W. Smith — for decades.

So it's no surprise the owner of world-renowned Julien's Auctions picked up the phone a few years back when Corzine called: Corzine wanted to get an item donated to help fundraise for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis.

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How about one of Michael Jackson's "Smooth Criminal" white fedoras? auctioneer Darren Julian said.

Sold! Corzine responded.

But what's Corzine going to do with a hat from the King of Pop?

"I didn't feel like I could throw that in with a gift card and a set of snow tires," he said.

No, but Corzine could get other lids from famous friends and hold a big online auction called Hats Off to St. Jude. After several years of gathering hats, Corzine finally is coming close to launching the event.

And he has a very personal reason for doing it.

'It was terrifying'

When she was 6, Corzine's middle child, Mallory, started throwing up now and then at school.

"I remember several times chasing a friend on the playground when suddenly I became horribly nauseous," said Mallory Corzine Achterbosch, now 28. "A teacher would whisk me inside to the nearest bathroom or trash can where I would throw up, then quite oddly be absolutely fine again."

Doctors couldn't find anything wrong with her stomach, but her main pediatrician eventually ordered a scan of her brain.

Corzine was in his Music Row office when his wife called with results: it was a brain tumor, and she was on the way to the hospital with their daughter.

"It was the absolute scariest thing you can imagine. Your mind goes the worst possible scenario," he said. "It was terrifying."

By then, Corzine already was a board member for St. Jude, a research hospital that treats childhood cancers for free, and a popular charity among the Music Row crowd.

Several months after Mallory started receiving care in Nashville, longtime actress Marlo Thomas, St. Jude's national outreach director, pulled Corzine aside before a board meeting and said St. Jude would take over his daughter's treatment.

Within weeks, surgeons successfully removed the child's brain tumor, and the girl woke up from surgery, asked for a stack of pancakes and ate them all. (The Corzines eat pancakes every Sept. 22, the anniversary of the surgery, to celebrate Mallory's good health.)

"People say the happiest place on earth is in Orlando, Florida," Mallory said. "I say it’s in Memphis, Tennessee. Hope runs rampant through the halls at St. Jude; there’s no place like it.

"Before I was at St. Jude, when my parents would pick me up from school to take me to my appointments, I would cry in fear as we pulled up to the hospital — I hated going there. Once I became a patient at St. Jude, we couldn’t get there fast enough!"

Now, Corzine, now the executive director of the Fisher Center of the Performing Arts at Belmont University, feels like he can't do enough for St. Jude. So he's trying to make this celebrity hat auction as big as he can.

It's a no from Buckingham Palace

He even sent a request to the Queen of England when she was alive. (FYI, Corzine heard back from Buckingham Palace: "Thank you your inquiry. Her Royal Highness does not donate clothing items.")

So far, he has signed bandanas from Willie Nelson and George Thorogood, autographed cowboy hats from Brad Paisley, Alan Jackson and John Rich, a crazy skull top hat from rocker Alice Cooper, an autographed (and doodled) black stovepipe hat from guitarist Slash, autographed ballcaps from Tony Bennett, James Taylor and Chip and Joanna Gaines, and a cowboy hat from George Jones' first ever publicity pic.

The 20th anniversary of his daughter's life-saving surgery is coming up next Sept. 22, so Corzine hopes to launch the online auction in a few months so he can spend a year fundraising. Until then, he hopes to get hats from Taylor Swift, Garth Brooks, Elton John, Lady Gaga and more.

Mallory, now married and raising the couple's first child, said she is thrilled with her dad's efforts.

"This unique idea to fundraise for St. Jude is so on par for my dad," she said.

"He is full of creative ideas and full of love for St. Jude so this Hats Off to St. Jude auction is a perfect combination of those two wonderful qualities."

Know of a good news story? Find Brad Schmitt at brad@tennessean.com or 615-259-8384 or on Twitter @bradschmitt.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: TN man to auction hats from Michael Jackson, Alice Cooper for St. Jude