By Thomas Sellers Jr.
For years Leanna Dagen has taken a backseat to her family, friends and colleagues.
Quietly being a driving force, supporter and backbone, Dagen enjoyed the success of her husband Larry in business and becoming a Millington alderman.
Their three children Ryan, Brett and Katelyn all achieved the milestone of valedictorian at Millington Central High School. Leanna’s career of volunteering and civic duty has shined the spotlights on those like Thomas McGhee, Cary Vaughn, Terry Roland and others.
Recently the readers of the Millington Star flooded the online ballot box in favor of Leanna Dagen to finally get her shine as the 2022 Woman of the Year for her work and service in 2021.
“It’s very sweet,” Dagen said. “It’s very nice and I appreciate it. I feel like there are so many people in our community that deserve this award and possibly others. I feel so privileged to be a part of it.”
Dagen said she is proud to be a board member of the Millington Area Chamber of Commerce, the Millington Exchange Club and founding member of the reborn Millington Education Foundation.
“We have reignited that over the past 7 or 8 years,” she recalled. “I was a part of being able to start that again. I worked with Cary Vaughn to be able to get volunteers to serve. The nice thing is being able to be a part of something in the community that makes funds available and taking donations from everyone to be able to give back to the children in the schools.”
Since the reforming of the MEF in 2014, Millington Municipal Schools have received $128,617. Dagen served on the board alongside Vaughn, Mark Healy, Karroll Warberg, Karla Hornsby, Beth Hearn, Rebecca Fears, Chuck Hurt Jr., Randy Hart, Jeremy Tincher, Mark Neal, Thomas Sellers Jr. and Rosie Crawford.
Prior to joining MEF, Dagen took up causes like protecting disadvantaged and endangered children.
“I have also served in the Millington Exchange Club for several years,” she recalled. “I am currently serving as secretary. I have served as a secretary on many different occasions. Working with the Exchange Club is very gratifying because the things we do helps funds anti-child abuse programs.
Another outreach of Exchange Club is giving back to the elderly like with the Night Before Christmas at Wesley Towers gathering bags and bringing them to the nearly 100 people there at the nursing home.
Dagen has added to her plate serving on the board of the Chamber of Commerce. She will be on the frontline of the development and growth happening in Millington.
With all that going on, Dagen still has a day job.
“I am a full time real estate agent,” she noted. “I love that and I have been doing that for about 15 years. That is also very gratifying being a part of people’s lives at a time they need the support and knowledge. They might be moving to the community, leaving the community or a first-time home buyer.
“There are so many people retiring and moving to retirement communities,” she continued. “They are leaving homes they’ve lived in for 40 years. I am blessed that Millington has a great location and I am able to travel to all my businesses in Memphis and East Memphis.”
At home Dagen has been a co-owner of businesses with her husband currently operating Dagen’s Living Water Christian Bookstore, Dagen’s Jewelry, Dagen’s Trophies & Awards at 4952 Navy Road.
Also Leanna became a “Team Mom” over the years supporting Larry in his many coaching ventures.
“I love so many things about coaching,” she said. “For so many years Larry coached and it was nice when he was coaching our children. But for most of those years he gave back to other kids. Also that came with some obstacles with coaching baseball. He wouldn’t get home until 10 o’clock at night.
“Football was nice because it was every Friday night,” Leanna recalled. “And he coached soccer as well. That was fun.”
Watching Larry coach all three of their children in soccer are memories Leanna cherishes. And she also looks back fondly at the Trojans who became like family to them.
“And being able to be a part of kid’s lives and those who did not have structures at home and had needs,” she said. “We were able to help kids when they had needs or their parents. In terms of aldermen, sometimes I am uncomfortable with things but it is great to serve the community in that regard. Larry is at an advantage and disadvantage at times. Working in the community, people can walk in at any time of the day and they can reach him. But I am always supportive.”
Leanna has always been supportive of Millington schools since the days her children attended EA Harrold Elementary. She said the efforts of the educators in Flag City helped her trio reach the milestone of being No. 1 in their classes,
“I looked at the really positive things about Millington schools,” she recalled. “At EA Harrold, the elementary school was filled with a lot of love. It was definitely hard at times because the building and the facilities weren’t something some of the parents would have sent their children to. But we could not replace all the advantages that came out of EA Harrold with the principal, the teachers. They all got a good foundation there.“
The next chapters for the Dagen children came at Millington Middle School and Millington Central High School leading to them becoming a dentist, orthodontist and lawyer.
“Millington was such a great community with a lot of military here at the time,” Leanna recalled. “It was also so easy for a parent to serve. It was easy to be in the PTA or be able to help with accelerated readers. It was so much there to be involved with the schools. I give a lot of credit to the teachers and staff and administrators at the school.
“Of course we gave them structure but once you start doing OK in school or getting A’s you see yourself as ‘I can do it,’” she added. “I was really happy to be able to take advantage of what the schools had to offer like the Honors Programs and things like that. They all ended up staying in Memphis and going to Rhodes College. Which they got a lot of scholarships they may have not been able to get in other areas.”
Speaking of other areas, the 2022 Woman of the Year serves on the Planning Commission.
“It is so nice to be a part of the city during this time of growth,” she said. “Serving as the secretary and I get to sign the plans with the shopping centers that are coming or restaurants and all the things that are going on, we’ve waited a long time for the business growth. Now we have residential growth.”
Now ready to turn the spotlight back to the others, Dagen said the recognition as 2022 Readers’ Choice Woman of the Year is a blessing she will always cherish.
“I felt gratified to be able to be recognized,” she concluded, “but I feel very grateful for the people I work with that serve in the community.”
