Rotary to host Wheels for Wheels Cycling Challenge
The Sanibel-Captiva Rotary Club will host the 5th Annual Howard S. Danner, Jr. Wheels for Wheels Cycling Challenge on Nov. 4 to raise money for the Sanibel-Captiva Rotary Trust Fund.
All monies donated will go to the Wheelchair Foundation. It is a nonprofit organization leading an international effort to create awareness of the needs and abilities of people with physical disabilities, promote the joy of giving, create global friendship and deliver a wheelchair to every child, teen and adult in the world who needs one, but cannot afford one.
Rotarian and the Rev. Dr. John Danner created the fundraiser in honor of his father, the Rev. Howard S. Danner Jr., a pastor and college professor who was struck by a drunk driver while biking and was paralyzed from the waist down, leaving him in a wheelchair for his remaining 17 years.
On Danner’s 60th birthday in 2013, he rode his bike from just north of Fort Lauderdale to Key West — a total of 190 miles — as a fundraiser for wheelchairs. He called it the Wheels for Wheels/60 for 60. His goal was to raise enough money for 60 wheelchairs. Danner raised $22,000 and helped to distribute over 200 wheelchairs in Trinidad. The fundraiser was later renamed and expanded to include the club.
“I am so pleased that this yearly effort honors the memory of my dad, who spent 17 years as a paraplegic in a wheelchair. Over the years of the club event in his name, and the first solo ride when I turned 60, we have funded close to 750 life-changing wheelchairs,” Danner said.
For more information, visit https://sanibelrotary.org/.