Carnegie Hero Fund Commission

List of officers and members, Deed of trust, By-laws, List of wards, etc.

There are heroes who walk among us: the clam digger who rescues a man from a burning retirement home; the dancer who prevents a robber from shooting two policemen at a nightclub; the former Marine, blinded during the Korean War, who saves two women from drowning in a river. What they have in common—besides the willingness to risk their own lives to save that of a friend or a stranger—is an unwillingness to brag about their actions. In 1904, moved by the stories of two men who died trying to rescue others in the devastating Harwick Mine Disaster that killed all but one of 180 men, Andrew Carnegie conceived of a fund to reward selfless acts of bravery and courage. Since its creation 120 years ago, the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission has awarded more than 10,000 medals and distributed more than $44 million in awards, grants, tuition, and other assistance. Published under the auspices of the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission, the original edition of A Century of Heroes received an award of excellence in 2005 from Communication Arts and, along with its accompanying video, remains a part of the awarding materials given to each Carnegie hero. Updated and expanded, A New Century of Heroes profiles more than 200 medal recipients: ordinary men, women, and children who undertook extraordinary acts to save the lives of others. It also reveals the tireless efforts of investigators who roamed the United States and Canada, collecting data on the hundreds of nominations received each year for consideration and conducting thousands of interviews with rescuers, witnesses, and individuals whose lives were saved. Their maps, diagrams, and marked-up photographs, many of which are included in this volume, illustrate the high standards and strict requirements imposed by the Commission to ensure that a Carnegie Medal recipient truly deserves the appellation “hero.” Only about one in ten nominees is selected for recognition. The heroes featured in this book offer a cross-section of the thousands of honorees who have received the award. They represent only a few of the inspiring stories that uphold the Carnegie Hero Fund’s legacy, reminding us that true heroes are found, not on television or in comic strips, but in the uncommon strength that lives inside all of us.

On January 25, 1904, a massive explosion ripped through a mine beneath the town of Harwick, Pennsylvania, killing all but one of the 180 men below ground. Andrew Carnegie, then retired and living in New York, was moved by the disaster, particularly the selfless acts of two men who died in failed rescue attempts. Within six weeks he was hard at work establishing the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission, which both redefined what it meant to be a hero and helped to establish modern philanthropy. In the past hundred years, the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission has awarded over 8,700 medals for heroism and distributed nearly USD27 million in awards, grants, tuition, and other assistance. heady days when a handpicked group of men set out to design a new organization under the intense glare of media attention to the present - and offers unique insights into how it investigates and authenticates the hundreds of acts of heroism reported each year. It is the heroes' stories themselves that form the heart of the book - profiles of more than one hundred ordinary men and women who risked their own lives to save those of others. In these pages you'll meet A. James Jimmie Dyess, the only person to be awarded both the Carnegie Medal and the Medal of Honor, and Louis A. Baumann, Jr., a seventeen-year-old boy who was awarded the very first Carnegie Medal. commission to have been twice named heroes: Henry Naumann of Hammond, Indiana, John James O'Neill, Sr., of Yonkers, New York, Rudell Stitch, of Louisville, Kentucky, and Daniel Elwood Stockwell of Phippsburg, Maine, and later of East Swanzey, New Hampshire. Medals have been awarded fifteen times for rescues performed on the Niagara River, just above the falls. Between July 11, 1904, when Daniel Davis died attempting to save a fellow miner from suffocation in Sherodsville, Ohio, to September 23, 2001, when twelve men died trying to save a coworker in the wake of a methane explosion in a mine near Brookwood, Alabama, the commission has awarded more than 150 medals to brave and unselfish individuals who took part in mine rescues. participated in relief efforts following national and international disasters, such as the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, the sinking of the Titanic, the crash of Air Florida Flight 90 in the Potomac River, and the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. For the most part, however, the commission's work has focused on recognizing smaller acts of heroism which did not capture the attention of the country as a whole. Carnegie Heroes have saved - or attempted to rescue - people from burning buildings, rabid dogs, attempted murders, cave-ins, drownings, avalanches, and other perils. hundredth anniversary, A Century of Heroes is both an homage to the thousands of men and women who have demonstrated their willingness to sacrifice everything for other human beings, and a lavishly-illustrated celebration of the unexpected heroes who walk among us.