So I'm officially running in the Chicago Marathon. For those of you who hadn't heard, I've been thinking about doing it for a while and decided this year would be the year I finally do. The problem is that the Chicago Marathon registration closes once it reaches capacity, and this year it filled up in April, way before I would've expected.
Another way to sign up for the marathon is through a charity. I checked a bunch of them out. An Alzheimer's charity (my grandfather has it), Leukemia & Lymphoma (a friend's suggestion), Children's Memorial (everybody wants to help sick kids)... but all of them were filled. But then I found the Eastland Disaster Historical Society.
My great grandmother and her brother were on the Eastland, a large ship that was carrying 2,571 people to the Western Electric employee picnic. It was over capacity, and the ship was a temperamental one to begin with. On July 24th, 1915 the Eastland rolled over in the Chicago River. 844 passengers and crew died in this disaster. Thats more than those who died on the Titanic, and more than double the number of people who died as a result of the Great Chicago Fire.
My running the marathon will help raise funds for the Eastland Disaster Historical Society to help them educate the public on this little known event in Chicago history. Yep, this entry is, in fact, me asking for you to help me out by donating to my fundraising.
You can find my donation page here. The standard options for donations are $50, $100, $150, or $262, but I don't want anyone to feel like they need to donate any of those amounts. If you can help me out with 30 bucks, thats fine. Heck, $5 is better than nothing. If you're not comfortable using the online donation page, you can talk to me and I'll totally take any donations in person and get them to the Eastland Historical Society. And if you can't afford to donate anything, thats fine. I'll still be your friend. Probably.
Posted by hollimer at May 19, 2007 1:00 PMI'll contribute by picking you up from the L when you can't walk afterward. Just kidding, I'll make a donation when I get paid.
Posted by: Dan at May 21, 2007 6:14 PM