Morris Gardner is a decorated veteran injured while serving as a company medic during the Vietnam war. While rehabbing as a patient at the VA Hospital in Atlanta, he and other vets were in voted to a wheelchair basketball clinic conducted by the local team: the Atlanta Rolling Recks. Morris would return home to Alabama in 1971 and become part of the new team in Birmingham called the Birmingham Chariots.

Morris would play for Birmingham the next five years and was inspired by the sport to become more involved. He attended UAB where he studied for a degree in Occupational Therapy, so he could become involved in the medical and functional player classification system utilized in wheelchair basketball to define participants in the sport. He also became an administrator in the sport. 

The late '70s and 1980s was a time of rapid growth. Morris, as the Southern Conference Commissioner, advised and guided the Southern Conference to grow to 15 teams playing in 3 different divisions. tHe Southern Conference became the largest and most developed Conference under Morris' leadership.

In 1985, Lakeshore Rehab Hospital built a gym and training facility and adapted the Chariots basketball team. Morris then advised lakeshore to hire Frank Burns as its first athletic director. For the next 12 years, Gardner and Burns worked to build the present day Lakeshore Paralympic Training Center. As a tribute to his vision and service to the country, Morris was honored on the day lakeshore received the Olympic Rings and official designation as an Olympic and Paralympic training venue. 

From 1992-1996, Morris continued to serve the sport as the Treasurer and member of the NWBA Executive Committee. Under his watch, he championed legislation that included the Tournament Selection Committee, guidelines for the development of sport wheelchairs, all the while being a good steward of the organization.

Morris retired from the sport in 2000 after 30 plus years of service to the NWBA and now resides in Trafford, AL with his wife Linda.