By Christina M. Wright
The Herald Bulletin
ANDERSON, Ind. —
Ruth Pritchett, an Anderson advocate for cancer research, saw a rockin’ idea when she visited a Delaware County Relay for Life event just before Madison County’s Relay for Life.
Rocking chairs with signatures for cancer survivors and fighters. Delaware County cancer advocates had given donations to sign loved ones names.
“I saw what they had done and I thought, ‘That’s something we can do,” she said in a recent interview.
Pritchett set forth asking for permission to steal the idea and then pulling together the project with just two days before its debut at the Madison County Relay for Life.
She convinced the Anderson University School of Adult Learning, where she is a recruiter, to co-sponsor the project with the Madison County American Cancer Society. Lowes agreed to donate two white chairs. And, Eckstein’s House of Awards made up matching business-card sized metal plaques to be attached.
“It happened very, very quickly,” Prichett said. “It was kind of meant to be because of how it worked out.”
She was set for the big debut, where she hoped to get most of the chairs filled, Prichett said.
“Unfortunately, we had bad weather conditions,” she said. “We thought we would get more (signatures) than that,” she said.
The same storm that blew through Chicago, breaking windows at the Willis Tower, swept through Anderson and ended the event early.
The almost barren chairs have been on “tour” around Madison County since the relay, and can be signed almost daily at the Anderson University School of Adult Learning.
“It’s kind of nice to have that person’s name go on for all of time on a rocking chair,” said Laura Market, the director of the Madison County American Cancer Society.
Pritchett said anyone can pay $2 to sign the name of a cancer survivor or someone who has survived the disease in an color permanent marker they pick. The proceeds will be donated to the American Cancer Society.
“We want them to be full,” she said. “I want people to be trying to sign around the spokes.”
The ambitious project leader is hoping to raise $1,000.
But, Market said she was expecting it to bring in a couple hundred dollars but thought it was “unique idea.”
The chairs have been on “tour” since.
Contact Christina M. Wright, 640-4883, christina.wright@heraldbulletin.com.
