Meet the extraordinary Dr. Keith B., a Mobile native, self-proclaimed “weather nut,” and sailing enthusiast who now lives in coastal Alabama with his wife. The couple also has three grown children. He weathered storms both in the sky and in academia, spending over two decades enlightening minds at the University of South Alabama (USA). Before arriving at USA in 1996, he traveled a long and winding path in meteorology as a civilian with both government and private sector employers, then as a military weather officer in the U.S. Air Force.

Just when you thought his story couldn't get more captivating, life threw Dr. Keith a curveball in the form of Polycystic Kidney Disease (PKD). A man accustomed to forecasting the weather found himself in an unexpected health storm, needing a kidney transplant.

His mother and younger brother had already passed away years earlier from complications associated with PKD, and he vowed to not end up in the same situation with his PKD diagnosis. One month after his mother died in 2006, he learned had inherited PKD. He took extraordinary measures to prolong the function of his progressively failing kidneys in the hopes that eventually he would be able to avoid dialysis and obtain a life-giving kidney transplant. After a long and turbulent road on the kidney transplant list, a relative was ultimately approved as a live kidney donor; transplant surgery was then scheduled at UAB.

Dr. Keith recovering post-transplant with his cousin and kidney donor, Suzanne.

Dr. Keith received his kidney in September, and we had the honor of housing him, his wife Mary Ann, and his daughter Amy, who found their post-transplant, home away from home in a Red Mountain Grace apartment. Dr. Keith battled the winds of early post-transplant life, overcoming some unexpectedly serious and prolonged post-transplant complications and setbacks, requiring three additional surgeries and two more re-admissions back into UAB Hospital.

In between hospital stays, he resumed recovering in the apartment with the help of his two outstanding caregivers. He expressed his tremendous gratitude to RMG that they were able to stay for many more unplanned weeks in the Birmingham apartment a few blocks from UAB Hospital, particularly during the critical hours surrounding the onset and subsequent surgery recoveries. He said that had they not been in the local area near the UAB Transplant Clinic when these complications quickly arose, the delay in getting the correct medical assistance would very possibly have led to the loss of the transplanted kidney, along with severe life-threatening health issues for himself.

During their 80-night stay, we were able to provide them with a Thanksgiving meal. The day became more than a holiday for the family; it marked a triumphant milestone - Dr. Keith indulged in his first proper meal in years during the RMG Thanksgiving feast. Having kidney disease, he had a very restricted diet for many, many years before his transplant, which excluded a huge number of common foods, several of which comprise a normal Thanksgiving meal.

Dr. Keith kindly shared that their RMG apartment surpassed their expectations, providing them with comfort and everything they needed.

"Words cannot express how grateful we are to Red Mountain Grace for everything they provided us during our stay. We cannot imagine how our 2.5-month stay would have been if we had not had the apartment. Having a well-furnished kitchen, comfortable furniture, comfortable beds, good internet access and television options helped me with the severe physical limitations I had and the lack of mobility I experienced during much of my recovery.”

Dr. Keith working in his RMG apartment.

Reflecting on the crucial role the apartment played in his recovery journey, Dr. Keith emphasized the importance of a well-furnished kitchen, comfortable furniture, and the convenience of proximity to UAB Hospital. The apartment became a second home, a beacon of normalcy amid the storm - gracious hospitality.

"We were here in Birmingham for much longer than we had first anticipated, and the apartment began to feel like a second home to us. The fact that we were provided with a full kitchen, washer, dryer, and two separate bedrooms made a world of difference. I can't imagine how it would have been staying all this time in a one-room hotel like we had originally planned."

Amy echoed their heartfelt appreciation, expressing profound thanks for the apartment that played a pivotal role in their journey. "We can't thank you all enough for providing us an apartment with Red Mountain Grace. It truly has helped more than we can say.”

Dr. Keith's resilience, Mary Ann and Amy's unwavering support, and Red Mountain Grace's commitment to providing a home away from home made for the perfect conditions for a great recovery.

"Thank you to everyone who made us feel welcome and at home here. The meals given to us, the support, and having a safe and comfortable place to stay meant so much to us. We will always remember your kindness."

Join us in celebrating stories of triumph, gratitude, and the remarkable individuals, like Dr. Keith, who inspire us every day. 

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Dr. Keith is truly a remarkable and fascinating individual. We have included his impressive bio below:

Dr. Keith became interested in hurricanes at the young age of 13 after the landfall of extreme Category 5 Hurricane Camille on the Mississippi/Alabama coast in 1969. Passionate about weather, particularly hurricanes, he pursued college degrees and a career in meteorology which took him on an opportunity-filled road around the country, eventually leading back to his hometown and the Alabama Gulf Coast. Now an Associate Professor Emeritus in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of South Alabama (USA), he played a critical role in the development of the state’s first and only Meteorology academic major.

While at USA, he taught numerous meteorology courses, including a 12-credit hour capstone course sequence for senior meteorology majors. He also spent 21 years as the Chief Hurricane Specialist and researcher/forecaster with the University’s Coastal Weather Research Center and also taught college-level hurricane classes during many summers at the Dauphin Island Sea Lab.

Dr. Keith is also a retired weather officer (Lt. Colonel, U.S. Air Force) where he spent 13 years on active duty and 7 years in the Reserves.  He had active-duty tours at Little Rock Air Force Base (AFB), Arkansas; Texas A&M University in College Station, Texas (where he earned his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees); Offutt Air Force Base in Omaha, Nebraska; and then at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs. His assignment at Offutt AFB was with the Air Force Global Weather Central organization where he worked as a chief scientist/programmer in the Meteorological Models Section of the Software Development Division. He supervised the development of the Air Force’s first relocatable weather forecast computer model which ran operationally for the first time during Operation Desert Storm in the Middle East in the early 1990’s. This model development was in response to the lack of good weather forecasts many years earlier during the disastrous failed 1979 rescue effort of the U.S. Embassy hostages in Iran. This rescue mission ended in disaster in the desert due to the rescue team encountering a surprise, un-forecasted, severe dust storm which led to aircraft collisions, explosions, numerous casualties, and mission cancellation. He also was tasked with temporary deployments where he provided critical weather support for chemical/biological agent air pollution dispersion threats in the Middle East and volcanic ash dispersion forecasts associated with the extreme 1991 volcanic eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines. He was then hand-picked for re-assignment to the U.S. Air Force Academy to help develop and implement a new meteorology major there for Academy cadets.

A weather wizard, a true Gulf Coast luminary, and Mobile native, this burgeoning meteorological maestro began his meteorological education after graduating from Murphy High School in Mobile, but it was anything but a straight-defined path forward. His freshman year in college, he attended the University of Alabama where he took math and physics prerequisites in preparation for future meteorology courses, knowing that he would have to transfer out of state to actually major in meteorology because there was no such major in the state of Alabama.  After seeing the Tide roll for 1 year under Bear Bryant, he subsequently transferred to a meteorology program at Florida State University (FSU) where he became president of the FSU Chapter of the American Meteorological Society. But after 2 years there, he had to withdraw from FSU after suffering a severe sports injury on the FSU intramural fields.

Once recovered, he transferred to the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he received a B.S. degree in meteorology.  Before graduation, he was selected for a paid summer internship with the National Weather Service Forecast Office in Birmingham (then located on Oxmoor Road). After graduation, he spent 1 year as an air pollution meteorologist at the Jefferson County Health Department adjacent to UAB on 6th Avenue South in Birmingham. He subsequently spent the next 2 years as a weather forecaster, consultant, and broadcast meteorologist with Capital Weather Service back home in Mobile before attending Officer Training School where he was commissioned into the U.S. Air Force. After leaving active duty 13 years later, he became a professor of meteorology at the University of South Alabama. He also continued military service in the Air Force Reserves with a 7-year assignment as Chief Scientist of Weather Forecast Applications at the 15th Operational Weather Squadron at Scott AFB in Illinois, located in the corn fields across the Mississippi River, east of St. Louis, Missouri. Back home, he also served for 12 years as scoutmaster and assistant scoutmaster in a local Boy Scout troop where his two sons both earned Eagle Scout.