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Medal honors man's heroism
Associated Press
Published May 6, 2005
PITTSBURGH - A retired Florida teacher who died saving a young swimmer from drowning was among 18 people selected Thursday to receive Carnegie Medals for heroism.
Domenic G. Giunta, 55, of Lutz, was fishing when a boy, his three brothers and grandmother were pulled into the Gulf of Mexico by a strong current near Dunedin last July 21.
Giunta reached the boy and held him above the water while he was submerged. The boy, his family and others who swam out to help all reached shore safely. Giunta was pulled from the water and later died of drowning.
Other recipients include a man who saved a woman trapped in her car on a railroad track as a train approached, a woman who saved a woman whose car slid off an icy road and into a river, and a woman who tried to save a 7-year-old boy from a burning house.
The Pittsburgh-based Carnegie Hero Fund Commission meets five times a year to choose heroes, who are brought to its attention through newspaper clips or tips to the commission's Web site.
Industrialist Andrew Carnegie started a hero fund in 1904 after being inspired by rescue stories from a mine disaster that killed 181 people. Honorees receive a bronze medal and $3,500. Since the fund was established, 8,902 people have received the medals and $27.7-million has been given in one-time grants, scholarship aid, death benefits and continuing assistance.
[Last modified May 6, 2005, 00:37:10]
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Fifty years ago, they were screwed-up kids sent to the Florida School for Boys to be straightened out. But now they are screwed-up men, scarred by the whippings they endured. Read the story and see a video and portrait gallery.
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