The power of purple
Cancer survivors, bus tour converge on courthouse lawn

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Paul Dieringer has beaten cancer twice. His wife Mary has beaten it once. But it wasn’t without a cost.

The couple lost their longtime DeGraff home and are now living with their oldest daughter near Raymond. They sold their life insurance policies — all to pay for medical expenses not covered by Medicare.

“We lost our home and everything in it because we had so many bills,” Mrs. Dieringer, 77, said Monday evening outside the Logan County Courthouse. “We need lower insurance and we need our government to help us out.”

Her comments were part of the kick-off of Paint the Town Purple Week that included a stop by the Cancer Action Network — the American Cancer Society’s political lobbying arm — touring bus, which arrived in Bellefontaine on the second day of a six-month nationwide tour.

The exterior walls of the bus, called the Fight Back Express, are filling rapidly with signatures as Ohio cancer survivors wrote words of hope, and those who have lost loved ones jotted messages of remembrance.

The purpose of the bus is to encourage national lawmakers to support policy changes and funding that will improve insurance or support research to fight cancer, area advocate Shirley James said.

“We aren’t supporting any party, we just want to make it known that America needs adequate health care,” the DeGraff native and breast cancer survivor said. “It isn’t fair that Americans have to fight this horrible disease and then find out they have no money left.”

The bus left Cleveland on Sunday after a national leadership conference and pulled into Bellefontaine on Monday as one of 17 stops in Ohio, said Bob Willman, the lead volunteer advocate for the state. Over the next six months, it will make its way through all 48 continental states.

“Ohio is unique and we decided to do the stop here because of your importance as voters,” Mr. Willman said.

The bus stop was coordinated with the Logan County Paint the Town Purple event that is intended to raise funds for various local Relay for Life teams. Purple is the adopted color of the American Cancer Society’s nationwide Relay for Life events, organizers said.

This year’s Relay for Life honorary chairwoman, Kim Wilson-Davis and Bellefontaine Mayor Adam Brannon made remarks before they were joined by 11-year-old cancer survivor Kelsey Savage of Bellefontaine and Nancy Harmon of the Mary Rutan Hospital Foundation to lead a group of about 150 people, most of whom sported purple clothing or beads, on a lap around the courthouse square.

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