Red Cross honors Central Mass. ‘Everyday Heroes’
by Lisa D. Welsh; TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF

TELEGRAM & GAZETTE (Massachusetts)
September 13, 2004 Monday, FINAL EDITION

Three years ago, Ross Ogden was an American Red Cross volunteer
participating in the relief effort at the World Trade Center.

“We all remember the stories of the heroes,” Mr. Ogden said during his
keynote speech at Friday’s Third Annual Heroes Breakfast, presented
by the American Red Cross of Central Massachusetts. “There were a
lot of heroes then, but there are a lot of heroes here today, too.”

Mr. Ogden, a member of the National Board of Governors of the American
Red Cross, came from headquarters in Virginia to recognize nine local
“Everyday Heroes,” and the professional heroes of Central Mass.

Representing their profession were: Lt. John Franco of the Worcester
Fire Department; Chief George Sherrill of the Holden Police Department;
Jack Chilton III of the West Boylston Fire Department; and Charles
Grosvenor of the Red Cross Disaster Action Team. Also in the room,
were the heroes whose names don’t usually appear in the newspaper.

“While heroes are defined in Webster’s Dictionary as ‘one of great
strength and courage, favored by the gods and in part descended from
them …’ the real heroes are the ones that no one knows about,”
said Mr. Ogden who has been an active disaster volunteer in numerous
relief efforts, including Hurricane Andrew and the 1994 California
earthquake in addition to the World Trade Center attacks.”People like
those who are in this room, who are called to action from within.”

The “Everyday Heroes” breakfast was the first event in the Red Cross’
new initiative called “Together We Prepare.” As stated by Mr. Ogden,
anyone can be a hero by being prepared and doing a few things before
the emergency strikes. “Build a kit, get trained, volunteer, give
blood and pledge to prepare,” he said.

The “Everyday Heroes” that were recognized at the ceremony were:

Robert Garabedian, of Worcester, who became a blood donor in 1997 when
his 31/2-year-old daughter Susan was diagnosed with leukemia. As she
began the process of treatment, Mr. Garabedian felt a need to take
action. After learning that the Armenian blood supply was one of the
last to be “typed” or chronicled, he began organizing blood drives at
his Armenian church and established an unofficial Armenian-American
Blood Bank. Susan has been cancer-free for five years.

Leo Provencher, of Templeton, a “seven gallon whole blood donor”
who has donated platelets every two weeks for the last three years.
Since discovering that he was a match with a patient in Worcester, he
started traveling once a week for five consecutive weeks to donate his
platelets. With every donation, Mr. Provencher also designated some
of his blood for pediatric AIDS research done at the UMass Memorial
Medical Center.

John Crowley, of Leicester, for boating into the night water to
save a stranger who had fallen overboard. As Mr. Crowley was reading
quietly at his home on Stiles Reservoir, he heard yelling. He took
a flashlight and his boat key and went outside where he saw a man
searching in the water for his friend whose canoe had capsized. Mr.
Crowley’s wife called 911 as he took his motorboat out to find
the missing man. Piloting carefully in the dark, he noticed an arm
sticking out of the water. Mr. Crowley reached in and pulled the man
out of the water and brought him to the ambulance waiting on the shore.

Rebecca Delano, of Dudley, for saving the life of a child. As she
dropped off her child at the YMCA’s day care, Ms Delano heard someone
say that an infant was not breathing. A Red Cross first-aid course
graduate, Ms. Delano began administering back blows and the infant
started to cough. She and a day care staff member worked to remove an
object from the infant’s mouth, which turned out to be a tiny sliver
of dried glue.

Orville Thompson, of Wheelwright, who was on his way to Barre Plains
when he thought he noticed smoke as he passed a house. Continuing down
the road, something told him to turn around. He pulled in across the
street and saw that the house was on fire. Mr. Thompson ran to open the
door where he encountered heavy smoke and heat. He couldn’t see anyone
but could hear the voice of 11-year-old Paul White who was still inside
the home calling for his dog. Knowing that the smoke was too intense
for him to enter, Mr. Thompson began to call for the boy to exit the
house. Minutes after he was able to direct the young boy to safety,
flames came through the roof and consumed the entire structure.

Michael Crimmins, 11, of Douglas, who was outside playing when he
noticed smoke coming from the chimney while his older brother was
inside. Without Michael’s quick thinking, alerting his mother about
the smoke and calling 911, his house may have burned down. Michael
had taken part in the “Student Awareness Through Fire Education”
program at his school and put the tools he learned into use.

Danielle Leary, a Shrewsbury High School student who took action after
reading an article about a high school football referee who had been
saved from a heart attack by an automatic external defibrillator
(AED). Ms. Leary decided that her own school system would be safer
by having all schools equipped with an AED unit. Through her efforts,
she raised more than $13,000 and worked with town officials to install
the AEDs at strategic sites. Ms. Leary is now certified in CPR Life
Safety and AED and has helped all those who live in her community.

Wally and Michele Connor, of East Brookfield who, after hosting
an exchange student from Abakan, visited that city in south central
Siberia. While there, they took a tour of the Yoletchka Children’s Home
where 95 children lived in a state-run home. The government supplied
food, heat and electricity but little or no clothing or supplies. As
a result of what they saw, the couple developed a system of providing
aid to the home: sending candy, toothbrushes, pens, hair clips and
toys; and starting the “Socks for Siberia” program that to date has
collected more than 600 pairs of socks, and 400 pairs of underwear
and pajamas for the children’s home.