Senior Day is always an emotional time. Football players, flanked by proud and beaming parents, are summoned to the field to receive warm acknowledgment from fans for their accomplishments as student-athletes.

In the fall of 2010, South Carolina guard Garrett Chisolm’s named was called on Senior Day, but he strode to the field alone, clutching a photograph in his hands. Chisolm parents passed away in a nine-month span that year – his mother, Purcella, died of ovarian cancer in January, his father, Garrett Sr., followed in September, succumbing to lung cancer. Chisolm stood on his own that day with a framed photo of his parents serving as a memory.

Chisolm, who is now trying to make the 49ers as a free agent, excelled through the immense tragedy. The 6-5, 295-pound former walk-on played superb football, helped feed the homeless, volunteered to read to children at a local elementary school and won several academic honors. He was a semi-finalist for the William V. Campbell Award, which is given to college football’s top scholar-athlete.

Chisolm also aided in the family business, Chisolm Janitorial, in Charleston, a 115-mile trek from Columbia.

“It’s just something you have to do,” Chisolm said when asked about his eventful senior year after an 49ers off-season practice on Tuesday. “You don’t really think about it.”

Chisolm emulated the work ethic of his father to reach his unfathomable accomplishments. “He worked from sun up to sun down,” he was quoted as saying. One of the younger Chisolm’s achievements including walking on to South Carolina as a junior and becoming a starter within a span of two months.

“I wouldn’t think that’s ever happened in the history of the SEC,” South Carolina offensive line coach Eric Wolford told the Orangeburg Times and Democrat.

After graduating with a degree in Sports Management and Business, Chisolm signed as a rookie free agent with the Dolphins last year, while still recovering from an ACL tear in his knee sustained playing basketball his senior year. He eventually landed on the practice squad before his release in September.

Chisolm is now trying to make the 49ers roster. He can play guard and tackle, but is concentrating on guard. He has left the management of the family business to his aunt, Aquilla Major, and is pouring all his efforts into the 49ers.

Still, the grief of losing his parents still overlays everything he does. When asked if time is healing the wounds of his bereavement, Chisolm, a man of few words had a firm answer.

“No,” he said.