The Courier-News has an article about firefighters from several departments selling t-shirts to benefit breast cancer awareness:
Members of six area fire departments have teamed up to sell T-shirts to raise money to help fight breast cancer, while Elgin firefighters are down to a small number of T-shirts of their own they have been selling for that cause.
The multi-department shirt sale is being coordinated by members of Carpentersville Professional Firefighters International Association of Fire Fighters (IAFF) Local 4790. While this marks the fifth year Carpentersville firefighters have sold such shirts, it’s the first time they have done so in conjunction with firefighter efforts in other towns, Firefighter Tony Ferreiro said [and] that last year Carpentersville firefighters raised $4,500 for the cause, with money going to breast cancer-related work at Presence Saint Joseph and Advocate Sherman hospitals. This year, the combined effort hopes to double that amount, with proceeds heading to Sherman.
Carpentersville Firefighter Chad Parker’s design for the 2014 shirt incorporates fire department patches from the six towns involved with the project — Algonquin, Carpentersville, East Dundee, Huntley, South Elgin, and West Dundee — along with a pink ribbon and the IAFF logo. Parker said the multi-department T-shirts are available to order online in men’s sizes and that hooded sweatshirts also are being sold through orders that can be placed until Oct. 31.
According to a press release about the Carpentersville project, “Firefighters exposed to carcinogens and other chemicals while on the job are disproportionately diagnosed with breast cancer — just one of many cancers linked to the work firefighters do. With one in eight women diagnosed each year, an estimated 232,340 new cases of breast cancer and 39,620 deaths will be reported in 2014. Among all women affected, 85 percent have no family history.”
In Elgin, the shirts have had direct meaning for the department, serving as a reminder of what one member and his family went through in their ordeal with the disease, Firefighter Josh Soderberg said. In April, 2011 Lt. Dave Hudik lost his wife, Cindy, to breast cancer after a struggle that began in late 2006. Soderberg said Elgin firefighters have been selling shirts to the public and wearing a version of their own while on duty. The department already has sold about 200 shirts, with 50 or so bought at an open house the department held last weekend. Next year, Soderberg hopes to sell them online. Each year, the firefighters’ October T-shirt project has raised about $2,000 for the cause.
Carpentersville firefighters also bought 300 T-shirts they are selling directly at Station 2, 305 Lake Marian Road, and they will be selling them at a benefit at a to-be-determined date in November at Rosati’s Pizza, 117 N. Kennedy Drive, too.
For more information on the multi-department shirt, contact the Carpentersville Firefighters Local 4790 at cparker@iafflocal4790.org or visit www.iafflocal4790.org. For information on the remaining Elgin shirts call Soderberg at 847-736-8980.
thanks Dan
