Thousands walk to aid cancer fight

SOURCE

Breast cancer awareness event raises more than $1 million

By LAUREN STANFORTH, Staff writer
First published in print: Monday, October 19, 2009

ALBANY -- It's not every day you see Vietnam veteran color guard members wearing pink camouflage hats, their black combat boots also sporting pink laces.

But when thousands of other people are adorned with pink feather boas, cowboy hats and sombreros, you have to get in the spirit.

"You can't buy these," said Rick Calordino, a member of the Troy County Council Vietnam Era Veterans, who kicked off the 14th annual Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walk in Washington Park Sunday along with his five fellow color guard members. Calordino, who is battling throat cancer, bought the hats online and sewed matching pink handkerchiefs himself. "No one is weird enough to sell pink dickeys," he said.

The veterans were among the 12,000 people who participated in what organizers believe is the largest memorial walk held yearly in the Capital Region. This year's breast cancer awareness walk, which is sponsored by the American Cancer Society, raised more than $1 million, with proceeds split between research, education and outreach.

"It's a great opportunity to raise awareness about the journey of a cancer patient," said Diana Martin, regional vice president of the American Cancer Society. who lost her father to brain cancer when she was 3 years old.

Pat Rushby of Halfmoon was one of the many walkers Sunday wearing pink T-shirts with the word "Survivor" emblazoned on the back.

Rushby's 7-centimeter tumor wasn't detected on a mammogram because it was deep in her chest. But her gynecologist believed something was wrong and eventually found the mass. Rushby had a mastectomy, chemotherapy and radiation, and she has now been cancer-free 14 years after her tumor was first discovered.

The retired fifth-grade teacher from Mohonasen now recruits about 40 to 60 people from the school district a year to either sponsor or walk with her.

Members of Kathy Plakas' family wore white T-shirts Sunday honoring her, two years after the 51-year-old Long Island native lost her battle with cancer. The mother of eight appeared in remission after enduring a double mastectomy. But a year later the cancer spread to her liver, and Plakas spent the next seven years battling it.

The Plakas family joined the walk only two weeks after her death, and have come back since.

"When we first walked in we thought there was a concert or something. It's amazing how many people show up," said Plakas' son, George, of Niskayuna.

Many others like the Plakases make it clear who they are representing on their clothing, whether it be a family member, friend, co-worker -- or in Tamara Webster's case, a teen idol.

Webster of Cohoes and four friends walked Sunday to honor Webster's grandmother, Joan Lambert, a breast cancer survivor. But the ladies also wanted to pay homage to their childhood musical crush, New Kids on the Block, because one of the group member's mothers had breast cancer. The New Kids fans had a name for themselves stitched on the back of their tye-dyed pink T-shirts Sunday: "Blockheads 4 Boobies."

Lauren Stanforth can be reached at 454-5697 or by e-mail at lstanforth@timesunion.com.

Read more: http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=854368#ixzz0URVcq7Tv

Danny Wood & Daughters Race For The Cure

SOURCE

Oct 18, 2009 by CAROLYN

New Kids on the Block star Danny Wood posed alongside his daughters Vega (left) and Chance at the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure Breast Cancer at Bayfront Park in Miami, Florida yesterday (October 17).

The 40-year-old singer is very involved in the fight against breast cancer, starting The Betty Wood Breast Cancer Foundation in honor of his mother, who died of the disease in 1999.

Danny also has son Daniel Jr and stepson Anthony.

Breast cancer fight has New Kid on the Block

SOURCE

Singer-songwriter Danny Wood sets up fund in memory of his mother

By Giacinta Pace

Cause Celeb highlights a celebrity’s work on behalf of a specific cause. This week, we speak with singer-songwriter Danny Wood of New Kids On The Block. He and other members of the pop group have done charity work in the past, including for the Make a Wish Foundation and fundraising telethons for cerebral palsy research. Their newest charitable project is raising funds to help fight breast cancer. Wood lost his mother, Elizabeth "Betty" Wood, to breast cancer in September 1999. In her memory, Wood and his fellow bandmates sold special-edition tank tops during their tour, “On The Block.” They raised more than $300,000 for Susan G. Komen For The Cure, an organization whose mission is to cure breast cancer. Wood also set up The Betty Wood Breast Cancer Foundation's a “Remember Betty” campaign to raise money for breast cancer research and to make sure the legacy of his mother lives on. Question: What inspired you to get involved with breast cancer research and awareness? Wood: My mother passed away from it in 1999 so I learned a lot from that. Watching her struggle with it made it a very personal thing and it took me years to accept it. Now through doing this and the group getting back together, it kind of gave me more of a reason why she was taken, because now her name is going to live on forever. It feels really really good. It’s great because my daughters are 10 and 11 years old, and now they’re going to have very vivid memories of her even though they were babies when she passed away. Q: What was your mother’s name? Story continues below ↓ advertisement | your ad here Wood: Elizabeth Wood — but everyone called her Betty. Q: What have you done to advocate for this cause? Wood: I partnered up with the Komen Foundation and since the beginning of our tour last September, we’ve been selling tank tops. In the middle of May, we presented them with a check for over $200,000 and we’ve raised over another $100,000 since then. Q: Who came up with the idea to sell these tank tops to benefit the Susan G. Komen Foundation? Wood: Well, I went to the guys in the very beginning when we were rehearsing for the tour and said I have an idea, I want to see what you guys think. Everyone was completely for it because, I mean, they were all very close to her too. Q: And what made you choose Susan G. Komen as the beneficiary for these donations? Wood: My mother had talked about the foundation and she had talked about doing some of the [fundraising] walks and stuff but she just wasn’t physically able to do it. I had that memory of her talking about it. Also, I had known other people who have done the walks. I did some research on the company and 87 cents of every dollar goes to research, so it just makes sense to go with them. Q: What has been the most rewarding experience for you working with the organization? Wood: Honestly, it keeps my mother’s name alive. And to see my daughters and my sons participate — they’re going do a couple walks with me. You know, more for them then for myself but my whole family — my sisters and my brother and my dad. When I had my dad tell me he’s very proud of me with everything I’ve done to keep her name alive — you know those kind of things mean the most to me. Q: How has your career impacted the way you feel about charity work in general? Wood: Even when we were young kids, the first time around, we were always doing charity work. We did the Say No To Drugs Campaign, we always did the Make-A-Wish Foundation, the cerebral palsy telethons. So, it was built into us through the way we were raised to always give back. But this was a much bigger thing. It started out as a small idea and now its turned into a bunch of things that I’m going to do in the future, so it’s more important for me actually to do this than the stuff I do with the group. View related photos