By Eddie Drews
TheStatehouseFile.com

INDIANAPOLIS—Twenty-seven years of marathon dances have raised $50 million for the Riley Children’s Foundation, which supports medical care for children at Riley Hospital as well as a camp for youngsters with disabilities.

Tuesday, that milestone was recognized in a program at the Statehouse where Indiana First Lady Janet Holcomb presented the foundation’s CEO, Kevin O’Keefe, with the honorary title, “Sagamore of the Wabash.”

The Riley Dance Marathon is an event which began in 1991 and takes place at different high schools and colleges across the Hoosier state. All the money raised goes toward helping Riley children and their families who are in need when they are sick.

“As a Riley Children’s Foundation board of governor’s member and Riley advocate, I’m grateful for the time and dedication Riley Dance Marathon students put into raising funds,” Holcomb told the group gathered in the south atrium. “Their passion for the kids is unparalleled.”

Riley Lesh, a junior at Decatur Central High School and a Riley kid since birth, shared some of her personal stories.

“I was born 15 weeks premature and weighed one pound 10 ounces when I was born,” Lesh said. “I spent the first 90 days of my life in the Riley neonatal intensive care unit.”

Lesh said she has participated in 250 Riley Dance Marathons since she got involved. O’Keefe said he can vouch for that.

“It doesn’t matter where in the state you are, which dance marathon it is, you’re going to see Riley there,” he said.

Holcomb then presented O’Keefe with a surprise—the Sagamore of the Wabash.

“It is given to our most noteworthy citizens,” she said as she presented the award to O’Keefe, who is about to retire after being with the foundation since 1998.

The dance marathon was created as a fundraiser in 1991, after the death of Ryan White, the Indiana youth who contracted AIDs from a blood transfusion. White also was named a Sagamore of the Wabash.

To close the event, IUPUI Riley Dance Marathon students performed a short dance.

FOOTNOTE: Eddie Drews is a reporter for TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.