5th Annual Run/Walk - Coming Spring 2006
Lifting with James started as a service project in 1983
with our club and continued until James’ death in the spring of
1999. Our club met James when he was 30 years old, 5 years after he
had been diagnosed with Muscular Dystrophy. MD is a disease that gradually
and irreversibly deteriorates muscle tissue. Our job was simple: help
him lift weights twice a week to keep his muscles as strong as possible.
James became an honorary member of our club in 1984, and lifting or
visiting with him was never really ‘service’ after that.
James was a friend, a fellow VT fan, and an unofficial historian of
our club.
James wasn’t supposed to live past the age of 40.
Five years later, our club said goodbye to a dear friend. Our club was
dedicated to James way beyond being a service project: we went to help
a friend. And our dedication helped James, probably prolonging his life.
And, in turn, James was dedicated to us: as a Hokie fan, as an example
of strength, and as a friend. He took and hung pictures of every Circle
K member he met and even when he was most sick, he never forgot a face.
His dedication to us as a club and friend bettered all who met him.
Since then, our club has worked to establish a scholarship
in his name through the University. We began fundraising in the spring
of 2002 in order to raise the funds necessary to endow the scholarship.
Our goal is to raise $25,000 in 5 years in order to be able to award
an annual scholarship of $1,000.
