The crowbar clanged against steel, echoing in the cramped room. Preston Redfield wiped the sweat and dust from his forehead and pulled again. Nothing. Hours had passed. Everyone else had gone home. The benches and cabinets lining the wall wobbled loose, but no matter how hard he yanked, kicked, or jumped on them, they refused to budge.
It was late — close to 9:30 p.m. His mom, Kristin, and grandmother waited outside, whispering prayers as they watched. Preston’s frustration mounted. The whole project had been tough, but this… this was something else.
Finally, exhausted, he climbed up and peered into the dark cubby above the shelf. There it was — one hidden screw. One more twist, one last effort, and finally one whole side of the structure came down with a thud. “There was no way I was leaving until that wall came down,” Preston recalled.
Preston exhaled in relief and wiped the dust-speckled sweat from his forehead. One obstacle down. A hundred more to go.
The locker room was little more than a glorified closet — cramped, outdated, and falling behind other teams’ facilities. Preston, a Trailman from Troop NC-0942 at Calvary Baptist Church in Winston-Salem, NC, asked his school soccer coach what the team really needed and the answer was clear: a new locker room.
Preston didn’t think twice. He’d been playing soccer at Calvary Day School since he was in fifth grade. This was his team, his family. If this was the need, he was going to meet it.
But the project was far bigger than he realized. The school served about 1,000 students, and the church that owned it had more than 3,000 members. Expectations were high. He had to raise funds, coordinate volunteers, and sell his vision. His brother had already built an outdoor classroom at the school a few years before for his Freedom project, and now, Preston wanted to continue the legacy.
He approached Sherwin-Williams for paint donations. He met with school and church leadership for permissions. He approached friends, fellow Trailmen, and soccer players to raise funds and gather volunteers. Two of his Trail Guides who worked in construction came alongside him as well.
It was a stretch for a quiet Trailman, but Preston had already been learning to step up. As First Officer in his troop, he once dreaded public speaking. “At first I didn’t want the role, because I hated the idea of embarrassing myself in front of everyone,” he admits. “But about two months in, I found my confidence. By the second term, I was comfortable in that position.”
That growth would prove invaluable for what lay ahead.
After months of planning, fundraising, and approvals, the stage was finally set. The old locker room had to go.
“I thought the demolition would be fun, but it turned out to be the hardest, most frustrating part of the whole project,” Preston recalls. “Getting the old stuff out of there was so difficult because it was bolted in. I pulled on it for hours. Everyone else gave up and went home. But I kept going ‘til late that evening. The screws were a little above eye level. To see where the screws were, you had to look up into the cubby, covered in dust. I finally found that last screw. I was SO frustrated. It was so loose. I was jumping on it, hours straight. The concrete wall behind it was a little loose, so I was also trying not to take the wall down.”
It was a valuable lesson in perseverance, but it was far from being the finish line. With the old equipment removed, it was time to start installing the new equipment. Preston brought two worlds together, his friends from Trailmen and his teammates from the soccer team — none of whom knew each other — to paint both the room and lockers. Outside, twenty new lockers were assembled in pairs and then carried in — heavy, awkward work on an uneven floor. “We had to match them up and screw them together,” Preston recalls. “It took a lot of people, and it wasn’t easy.”
When it turned out the lockers would block the attic access, Preston had to regroup. With help from his brother and his mentor, they relocated the entry — no small task in an attic no one had touched in years. They patched the old hole and pressed on.
Step by step, obstacle by obstacle, the vision came to life.
In the middle of sawdust and sweat, Preston carried a quieter responsibility.
A few years earlier, tragedy struck the local soccer community when Nathan Clark, an eighth grader from Preston’s school, was killed while on a trip with his league travel team. For his teammates, and everyone in the surrounding community, the loss was devastating.
One of the challenges Preston faced was making sure his renovation plans left space for a memorial for Nathan. “That was really important to him and Coach Kerth,” Kristin recalls. “He wanted to make sure Nathan was honored, no matter what.”
So with his mentor’s help, Preston designed a special corner cabinet. Not for cleats or water bottles — but as a tribute to Nathan. A place for memory, for respect, for the reminder that this room wasn’t just about athletes, but about brotherhood and life.
When the last coat of paint dried, the transformation was stunning. The new locker room looked professional, polished, and worthy of the team it served. “Preston’s mentor works in construction, and even he couldn’t believe how professional it all looked,” Kristin beamed.
But what Preston took away wasn’t just the satisfaction of a completed project. “It showed me I could think creatively, push through, and finish,” he reflects.
Trail Life had been shaping him for years in the same way — through friendships, challenges, and opportunities to lead. At first, he hadn’t liked camping — the bugs, the food cooked outside, the cold. But his parents urged him to stick with it. Over time, the friendships, mentorship, and leadership opportunities changed him.
Kristin saw it too. “Trail Life helped him step out of his shell,” she says. “Speaking in front of the Troop gave him confidence. When he stood up as valedictorian in front of 1,500 people, that was possible because of what he learned here.”
Preston’s time in Trail Life has given him the opportunity to learn valuable lessons that he will carry into manhood, lessons many boys don’t get to experience firsthand until they’re much older.
“One of the biggest things Trail Life has taught me is mentorship,” he says. “I was mentored by older boys when I was younger. Now it’s my turn to mentor the younger guys.”
“Some of the eighth graders at school have told me how much it means to them. That’s been a blessing,” he adds. “Trail Life showed me that’s how it’s supposed to work — one generation passing it on to the next.”
He’s quick to encourage younger Trailmen not to quit, even when the path feels tough. “Doing hard things is worth it. It gives you confidence,” Preston says. “Our Navigators once read a book called Do Hard Things. For me, it wasn’t always easy to stick with camping, but I’m glad I did.”
Kristin remembers a comment Preston made toward the end of the project. “He said, ‘None of the steps to get here are that hard — it’s just taking it one step at a time.’ That really sums it up. Perseverance, one choice at a time.”
And that’s exactly the lesson Preston is living — and passing on. Do hard things. Stick with it. Mentor the next guy. Because that’s what it means to Walk Worthy.