The following is an original production of WTCI.

For over 50 years, Sonia Young has been impacting the lives of children and adults in Chattanooga in her own perfectly purple way.

Oh, Alyson, that looks beautiful on you.

I think I might have helped her too much.

Nobody like that.

I been this week on the A-list.

I visit the home of Chattanooga's own purple lady Sonia Young.

This unassuming house sits in the middle of a quiet suburban neighborhood in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

But upon approaching the front door, it is clear that this is no ordinary house, and in it lives a woman whose colorful life has no intention of existing under the radar.

You feel so nice to see you.

Thanks so much for having me.

Many of you may know her as the purple lady.

And as you will see, purple is a huge part of this unique woman's life with an ever growing list of passions and talents.

Sonia juggles many titles with each new day.

She is an educator, an arts activist, a performer, a journalist and a philanthropist.

She is a dedicated mother to her daughter, Melanie, and she cherished 52 years of marriage with her late husband, Mel.

She is a lover of animals and proud owner of three rescued dogs, Romeo, Juliet, and, of course, Viola.

You've probably seen her around town covering charitable events for her monthly article, The Pen of the Purple Lady, which is published in both the Lookout and Signal Mountain mirrors.

And charity is a prevalent theme in Sonia's life.

She lives by what she calls the Purple Rule, which means simply do for others.

Sonia has been doing for others in Chattanooga and beyond for over 50 years.

She has been named Tennessee's woman of distinction, and there could be no more fitting title for a woman so dedicated to making her community a better place.

Well, Sonia, welcome to the A-list.

We're so thrilled to have you.

Well, I'm delighted to be on the A-list and also to have the pleasure of your company, even for a short time.

I want you to know I'm wearing my my designated purple shirt today in honor of this moment, because even if people hear your name, they may not immediately associate you.

But if they hear the purple lady, I think most people know exactly who you are.

I would hope so, because that really is exactly who I am.

How long have you been known as the purple Lady?

A long time.

Probably dates fully back to the time that I was working at the Speech and Hearing Center at Siskind and worked with the Deaf and Hard of Hearing.

And they designated me as the purple lady going down the aisle.

This is the sign for purple.

This.

This mark, this hand sign.

And they called me the purple lady.

Is that because you wore purple?

Oh, I love purple.

And why purple?

Purple.

I don't think I chose it, Alison.

I think it chose me.

It's a happy color.

It's a spiritual color.

And I have several things on walls around the house that tell you what the color purple means, what it means to be a purple person.

It's about someone who loves the arts, loves creative things, who loves people.

And it you have to say it.

It tells you exactly what purple people are.

Do you remember the point in your life where purple went from being, you know, a color that you wore around the children to really an integral part of who you were and your personality?

You know, I do think about that a lot, and I'm not sure exactly when.

I always loved it.

I just couldn't always get it to the extent that you could now.

And people send me things all the time.

I mean, the funniest was the horse that somebody delivered to my door.

The Portia was in purple and he said, One of your friends said you would want right by my health.

They'll send it back.

But anyway, a lot of things come to me.

I can be a store for thousands of things that I only see the purple things.

I love them all.

And as I told somebody, I said, when I see something purple, I think it should come home and be a part of my family.

And unfortunately, a lot of it does.

But the thing that I think I realized when I was the purple lady was I used to send my letter, I still do Lavender Love, and it was the Sonia Young.

And on the next line it was the purple lady.

Then one year on notice, it was Sonia Young comma, the purple lady.

And about three years ago I noticed I was signing everything.

The purple.

I'd become a Sonia Young.

And now it's just the purple lady.

So it's taken over.

The persona has become who I am.

How do you feel about that?

Love it.

Purple is a happy color.

It's a positive color.

The thing I love most about it is the comfort and color.

People will come up to me in all over the world and say, You look so pretty in your purple.

I love that color.

It makes me feel good.

They'll smile.

So it attracts people in a positive way.

It makes people feel better dispersing it.

I very seldom have a negative reaction, and if I ever do the one or two times I have, I'm always shocked by it because I love people and I can't imagine that they don't like me.

I haven't given them any reason not to.

But it is.

I have such a positive attitude toward people that if there is a negative reaction, I don't normally wouldn't say it.

Now, where did you grow up?

Here in Chattanooga.

Love it here.

Went to school here at Norval Park, North Junior High School, and kind of a high school product of the public schools.

And then where did you go to college?

Went to Sophia Newcomb College, which is now Tulane University.

It was there, too, but my mother preferred to think of it as a girl school.

And do you know what you wanted to be when you grew up, when you were in college?

Not really.

I majored in psychology and English and not a clue.

Just knew I wanted to do something.

But the options weren't as wonderful as they are today.

We had what we could become a teacher.

You became doctors, but basically we did not have the nurses.

We did not have the options that are open to women today.

I did not know.

So what was your focus after college?

What did you do?

I taught at Chattanooga High School.

Creed Bates gave me a job.

That's when I first learned how much fun it was to be in a classroom, which is where I am now.

Now, from what I know of you, you are a woman of many talents, many passions, and many hobbies.

But let's start with your main passion, and that's children.

How did you first get started working with with children, with special needs, with deaf children?

How did that become something you focused on early on?

Well, I did focus on it early on.

I worked with children at day camps and and, you know, just playing with them.

But Garrison Siskind insisted that I come to work for what was then called the Trust this Studies Center, and that was with special needs children.

And that's where I found where my total life avocation would be our vocation, both because I do it also in my volunteer work with children.

He got me started on a lifelong love for special needs children.

And what did you do with with Siskind when you were there?

Well, I first started out in the nursery with children with a mixed bag of special needs, because they weren't as highly structured then as they are now.

So I had some autistic children, deaf children, children who were Down syndrome.

There were quite, excuse me, quite a mixed bag, but I eventually then concentrated on children with speech and language impairments.

The deaf, as well as children who had languished problems, whether it was stuttering or whether it was learning disability.

Has it been traditionally easier for you to connect with children rather than adults?

I am a child.

They say that up to the age of 12, all children love the color purple, or at least all girls do.

And I just never grew past the age of 12.

It much easier for me to connect to children and to animals.

Those are my two love and now work for several animal, the zoo.

And they became a center.

And it is much easier for me to connect with children and animals.

We have kindred spirits.

Sonya's passion for children has been the focus of her lengthy career in public service.

Among her numerous achievements is the founding of the youth theater program at the Chattanooga Theater Center, which began with the appropriately titled first production The Purple Princess.

Since its genesis, nearly 30 years ago, the program has achieved enormous success.

And with a rehearsal room named in her honor, Sonya's legacy, there will be a lasting one.

But her outreach in the arts is only one of many ways that Sonia Young has made an impact in the community.

When did you first start writing?

Because what other people probably know about you besides being the purple lady, is that you are all about town.

And if there's an event happening or worthy of being written about, it's going to be written about by you.

Start writing.

Years and years ago for the Chattanooga Times, when it was the Chattanooga Times, then went to work for Chattanooga magazine and then now for the Lookout and Signal about mirrors, which is wonderful because they allow me to go to all of these wonderful community events and write about them and let people know the people that support these events and what the events actually, the causes that they support.

And that's wonderful to tell people what the great things that are being done in this community.

So when you go to an event, what's the first thing you look for that you're going to put in your your article?

Well, I've already done my homework on the event.

I already know the causes that it supports and what exactly the like the recent when I went to for the Medical Society, I knew that it supported project access to help people who are uninsured receive medical services.

So I already had my background information and then I have to go and find out one who's there, who the sponsors are, because they deserve a little extra credit, because they give a lot of extra money.

And also what we're doing, do we eat, drink and be married?

We have lab and salad options.

Do we have a wonderful band that I like to mention if they're really good and maybe get people to notice them?

So that's what I do.

But usually I stand outside and greet people and get their names and thank them for being there.

When you talk about your writing and how you talk about the wonderful things that go on in this community, how do you think that your perspective of the positive bounces out?

A lot of what we read in the papers or see on the news media these days about kind of the heartache of of our nation in this world?

What role do you think you play as a journalist in that arena?

Well, I don't overlook the horror and the heartache that goes on in the world.

I'm very aware of it, and I wish it were different.

I wish every child could grow up like I grew up in the fifties and forties because it was not a perfect life, but it was so much easier.

It really was.

We didn't lock our doors.

We could walk to the movies as a group together, not worry about somebody picking.

We just didn't have the terrorists that we had that the children now face.

It was an easier life, but we didn't have the Internet.

We didn't have a lot of other exciting things either.

This I have a perspective that my students at UTC, for instance, don't have.

I can remember the 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, and now I have a much better historical perspective.

I think a lot of the good things that have happened here look at all the industry, the excitement and many feels.

But on the other hand, I regret the loss of innocence that we had then to which we don't have now.

Tell me about your job at UTC.

This is my 20th year teaching in the theater and speech department and we've now I've taught several subjects at the department, but now I'm teaching public speaking, which is what I do in real life.

And I love it that the students keep me sane, they keep me young, they keep me balanced.

And with this, this world, their problems, I understand and they become my problems.

And they educate me about the technology and the current singers and bands so that I'm not behind in conversations with them.

They're wonderful.

I love teaching.

I really think that really was my calling is my calling.

How important is it for you, though, to make those personal connections with the people you come into contact with and whether that be your students or, you know, people within the community?

I'm so glad you asked me that question.

I really am, because all my life I've focused on the the forest, the organizations that I've raised money for, and there have been many and the organizations that I volunteered for.

But after all that, every valuated life a little bit.

And I decided it was time to look at the trees, the individuals.

And so now I've become face to face with individuals who I have worked with or talked with or tried to help on a one on one basis rather than on an organizational basis that was connected to children that I work with and my students.

But there's still a class.

Sometimes you get connected to the individual, and I'm making more of an effort to become connected to the individuals, the trees that the forth.

Her heartfelt connections to both individuals and organizations have made a significant impact.

In Chattanooga recently, Sonya collaborated with former and current patients at TC Thompson Children's Hospital to create a children's alphabet book entitled Chattanooga from A to Z.

She wrote the text that accompanies their vibrant artwork, and all proceeds from the book go directly into funding the hospital's programs.

But it is Sonya's Passion for Purple that has garnered international attention after being written about in two books.

Sonya was approached by Reader's Digest, who published an article about her love of Purple that made its way all over the globe.

Sonya's love of purple is visible in everything she does.

There is never a time when she is not wearing it or surrounded by it, and there is no greater example of the extent of her passion than her own purple palette.

Let's talk about your house, because it's very obvious after you take one walk around that this is not just a home.

This is really almost a shrine to all things that have been important to you that, you know, it seems like every every piece of artwork, everything that sits, even that might look like a little trinket actually has some pretty important significance to your life that someone either gave you or has a memory for you.

How have you surrounded yourself with that and how does that comfort you when you come here every day?

I'm amazed that you actually got it.

So many people come here and they see these acquisitions as things that collect.

They're not collections.

They are exactly what you said.

They are things that are mementos of important things in my life.

My snowball collections, many of them were given to me by friends, a musical, by the way.

And they're representing cities or shows or things I love.

I love Goliath.

And I know most of the glass blowers who've made the pieces I collect.

My paintings are about a lot of local artists whom I do love, and my cousin, who lives in New York.

I love Oriental things.

The house is built along Thai lines.

And yes, it just reminds me of triple trips I have taken of people.

I have known, of experiences I have had over there.

There's the the little bear is from a chef, a French chef who came from Provence recently to do a fundraiser for the Chattanooga Symphony Opera.

And he brought me the little bear.

So this is I have to show you this.

I love this.

This is she looks like you.

She should, but she's not.

This is just a wish, sugar plum fairy.

I took ballet dancing when I was little.

I always wanted to be the Purple and Sugar Plum Fairy, and I never could.

I have two left feet.

I support ballet, and I'm on the Chattanooga Ballet Board.

And so Bob Willey gave me the ballet dancer, because when I was 21, one of the things that I always wanted to be a ballet dancer, preferably the Sugar Plum Fairy.

So he gave it to me.

And there's Clara from the Sugar Plum Fairy.

But these are all from different France of She's cute.

I love her.

The redhead, the fatty.

There are a lot of this, actually.

I have a story.

I wrote children's stories.

I have published a name, but I wrote a story about death and the Dragon.

That was different.

Desmond with the Dragon.

The.

His long eyelashes.

And I wrote about him.

And one day I went into a shop, local shop here, and I found this man.

He was purple.

And it was such a shock because, I mean, this is like two years after I had written the story, there was Desmond the Dragon that was different.

Oh, wow.

And it was about tolerance, about people that are different.

Do you ever get tired of the purple?

Do you ever sometimes look around and say, I just feel like being green today?

You must come into my closet and see the shades of purple.

All my summer clothes are in a different closet and they're all light shades of purple.

They're lavenders and lilac and with various and different shades, winter clothes are all darker, shades of purple, ranging from Crayola crayon, purple to eggplant or aubergine.

It's totally different.

I have so many shades of purple that I could.

You get tired of it?

I never do it.

I can't imagine not loving it.

Well, it seems like purple's a fitting color for you.

Not because or just because of all that.

It represents about happiness and independence, but also about making a statement.

You know, from what I know of, you're a woman who is not afraid to make a statement.

You're absolutely right.

People who wear purple have to not be afraid to make a statement or be laughed at or smiled out or be noticed.

And I'm a theater person, and theater person are always onstage.

We're always presenting ourselves.

And so, of course, I mean, I love being paid attention to noticed.

You can applaud, too, if you like, but the whole point is purple.

Is that color.

And you can't be shy or embarrassed or not outgoing and wear this color because it attracts attention.

It I mean, just if you see you around town and see what you wear, you see your house, you know, you are serious about purple, but how serious are you?

Can you name a few of the things throughout your life that you have that isn't maybe the traditional purple accessory or or piece?

Oh, my.

Purple vacuum cleaner, possibly.

And I have a purple mixmaster that was made for me by Brian May and Maynard at KitchenAid, and he asked me what color Purple.

And I sent him a Crayola crayon and it's in the kitchen.

I have a purple microwave, all my dishes and chad and silver.

Oh, it's purple.

I don't have anything that isn't my cause.

Love my car.

Love I convertible.

It's purple.

I've always had.

This is my third purple convertible.

Love them all, Sonia.

I know.

Everybody's dying to know.

Is your bathroom even purple?

Yes, it is.

Can we see?

You?

Certainly can.

It became purple, Alice.

And it wasn't purple when I first moved it here, we redid it.

Wow.

Purple tub.

And I brought the shell back from Aruba.

The tile.

The shower is purple and the doors are purple.

Even your shower's purple.

Oh, especially purple, Including the bench indicator is purple.

Yes, it is.

We're talking theories here, and I don't even think about it.

It's just that when you show me samples to pick out, I gravitate to the purple sample.

It's what I see.

You know, sometimes you do, sometimes you don't.

Even the sponges or the little things.

That's not even a big thing.

This could be very bubble thing.

I have purple trash cans outside.

Not the one the city gave me, but the other ones are purple.

How often is it that you get something from someone either you know or don't know just because it's purple?

Probably once a week.

Really.

It could be food.

It didn't have to be, you know, like somebody gave me some purple potatoes last week.

It was cute.

And they cook purple, by the way, which is really neat.

Now, somebody saw it maybe not once a week, but at least twice a month if.

You eat non purple food for the rest.

Oh, yeah.

Okay.

Oh, absolutely.

I don't cook so I eat with ever there.

I don't.

But I always have purple on a plate.

My plates are all purple so ther Taking a tour of Sonya's house of Purple has been a revelation in the power of a color from purple clothes to a purple bathroom.

It sets a tone of comfort for this Chattanooga treasure, but to many, it may seem a bit unconventional.

Do you consider your life eccentric?

I think it's out of the box.

It's creative rather than eccentric, depending how you define eccentric.

I think of eccentric as a little bit less than favorable sometimes, whereas I think everything I've done has been within the boundaries of good taste and good values.

I'm very careful about that because I see myself as a role model for children.

So I'm very careful about not going too far out of the box.

And as a role model for children, what do you hope that they remember most about you besides Purple?

What do you hope that they take from knowing you or from those experiences that help them in their lives?

Well, I call it the Purple Path to perfection.

I'm working on a book and it's called The Purple Path to Perfection.

I hope they'll remember to put a little purple in their life, to put things in their lives that give them joy and happiness.

It's not all about work as such, but it's taking joy in everything you do and finding how to have fun in every aspect of your life.

I keep a purple Christmas tree up all year long and the children come over and they think It's just amazing that I can do that.

I said, Well, when you get to be my age and you know you're paying your bills, you can have a purple Christmas tree or anything else that gives you happiness.

You can keep the spirit going all year long.

How do you find balance in your life?

What are what are how do you balance out your work with your priorities?

With your philanthropy?

What takes priority?

My family always took priority.

But balancing is hard.

I'm sure you're finding it even more so than I am that I love all of the things I do and I don't want to give any of them up.

And when people say, Well, you're getting older, maybe you ought to slow down.

If anything, I've accelerated since the year that's passed that Mel has died.

I have actually accelerated what I do.

I filled up the hole with more more things to do and more people.

I will say this, Alison.

I'm in the best possible place I could be.

Finding balance.

Chattanooga, because this city has been so good and kind and thoughtful, the people have to be very supportive.

And I've had I've found that what gives me the balance is my faith, my family, my friends.

Without that, I could be so.

And I am well-balanced.

I really am.

It's amazing.

I can't believe it myself.

But it's this family.

It's this town and the people in it.

It's a really good place to be.

I can't imagine wanting to be anywhere else.

When you look back on your life here, is there one moment that you could distinguish as your proudest?

My proudest would probably be when we started the youth there that I was so thrilled.

That was like giving birth to another child.

Building the library I was on that committee was really good.

A good feeling, too, because I love the library.

I really can't think of any other moments other than through Melanie or Mel.

And their accomplishments and accomplishments are things I expect of myself.

I don't see them as accomplishment.

I see them as things that I should be doing.

I've always believed in the concept of mitzvah.

The good deed.

Well, that's the way I live each day.

By trying to do something good every day.

The day can't end until I can actually look back and say, okay, you got that done today.

And as you accelerate forward, which is a great way of putting it, what are the things that you have yet to accomplish?

I would like to get certain things done.

You know, that I think are still unfinished.

I'd like, of course, to see my daughter well and happy.

She just went through a year of breast cancer.

And, you know, my biggest now hope is that she will stay healthy and not have a recurrence.

But what is my I really don't have any single task that I have left to do.

There are a lot of little tasks that I'd like to see happen, like see the History museum finished.

I'd like to see a roof on the theater there.

But, you know, I just really would like to just go on kind of like I am with lots of friends and things to do.

I'll tell you, this has been a purple pleasure.

You have a perfectly purple dame, Alison and Lavender Love.

Will be coming out of the sky.

The one long horned, one big guy, two mistresses.

The lovely.

I prefer people eater to make it while the one eyed 1.5 million people.

People at one time.

1.5 people.

One had 1.5 to 4 people who looked strange to me, who came down to earth and lived in the trees.