A totally 'rad' day for Jenny's Run
By Patricia A. Russell/ Correspondent
Friday, June 10, 2005
NORFOLK - Moments before a road race was to begin on June 5, Karen Nardone stepped to the side of the parking lot at the H. Olive Day School and spoke about the late Jenny Canelli - the woman whose love for children inspired the fund-raising event.
"Jen was full of life and ambition and very dedicated to family and friends," said Nardone, adding, "she loved children."
Nardone said Canelli was a close friend and coworker and had been an active person who'd run and completed two Boston Marathons and had planned to organize and train a team of runners for this year's marathon (held annually in April) and donate the proceeds to a program that was near and dear to her heart.
"She died before she was able to do it," said Nardone, who coordinated the memorial 5K run/walk and quarter-mile kid's race.
Canelli died in a tragic fall at Providence Place Mall on May 5, 2004 at the age of 23. A radKIDS instructor at the time of her death, her goal had been to increase the availability of radKIDS programs to children and communities.
"The first Jenny's run for radKIDS will help to achieve her goal," said Nardone, also a staff instructor at the nonprofit organization that educates children by providing life saving skills on how to recognize, avoid, resist and, if necessary, escape abuse and abduction.
Since its inception in 1998, the personal empowerment safety education program has reached thousands of children across North America and has documented more than 150 successes in the prevention of violence and harm to children. radKIDS has been nationally recognized on America's Most Wanted, The Today Show, Good Morning America, Larry King, Fox and CNN
As a program instructor, Nardone said Canelli helped teach more than 200 local children.
"The radKIDS program was an important organization to Jennifer," said her mom, Jeanne who, along with her husband Gerry, walked in the event with their 31-year-old son, Gerry.
As she spoke softly, her late daughter's son, Colin, bounced a red ball in the school parking lot. The just turned 7-year-old lives in Norfolk with his grandparents. | |
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