It's amazing what friends can accomplish! What started as a friendship between the Manning family of Marlborough, Massachusetts, and Bob Haynes, President of the Massachusetts AFL-CIO, has developed into the Walk to Cure Cancer, drawing thousands of committed people whose lives have been touched by cancer and raising millions toward the goal of wiping out the disease.

Dottie and Dan Manning's son, Danny Jr., died in October 1994 from cancer, and only two years later cancer cut short the life of Dan Manning Sr. It was then that Bob Haynes approached Dottie and proposed creating a vehicle to fight cancer so that other families would be spared what the Mannings had suffered. After joining with the University of Massachusetts Medical School, the Walk to Cure Cancer was born.

Bob Haynes and Dottie Manning, 2007 Walk to Cure Cancer

Since the Walk to Cure Cancer began on Labor Day in 1999, passionate teams of walkers, formed by unions and their members from across the state, businesses and community supporters, have been instrumental in helping the UMass Memorial Cancer Center flourish from an idea to reality. Each year, as they set off from the starting line, walkers witnessed a changing landscape on the campus of the University of Massachusetts Medical School: from a groundbreaking in 1999, to girders outlining a structure in 2000 and finally a gleaming ten-story research facility, completed in 2001.

The Aaron Lazare Medical Research Building—which houses the 33,000 square foot state-of-the-art laboratory space of the UMass Memorial Cancer Center—is a symbol of hope rising above Lake Quinsigamond.

While the first years of the Walk were focused on the visible and concrete realization of a research facility, it is what has been taking place within that facility that has become the driving force that propels and gives meaning to those who walk to cure cancer.

In the ten years since the Walk began, the UMass Memorial Cancer Center has made great strides in its efforts to find a cure for cancer and has achieved major breakthroughs in understanding and treating non-Hodgkins lymphoma, leukemia and prostate, breast, colon, pancreatic and stomach cancers.

Aaron Lazare Research Building

 
Launching the Second Decade of the Walk to Cure Cancer

Please partner with us on September 13, 2009, as we launch the second decade of the Walk to Cure Cancer.

Join us for a fun-filled day consisting of a five-mile (or one-mile option) walk that begins and ends on the campus of the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, Massachusetts.

Become a team leader and form a team. You can help us reach our goal to raise $1 million for the 2009 Walk to Cure Cancer.

Imagine the possibilities. We can make a difference.... Together.