A list of heroes gaining national recognition this week includes men from Nebraska and Kansas.
Martin Hohenstein, 51 of Dakota City, Nebraska is one of 18 people from across the U.S. to receive the honor from the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission. Hohenstein was honored for rescuing a person from a burning vehicle that crashed in May 2014. Bryon Snyder, 36, of Topeka, Kansas, is honored for saving a 44-year-old woman from an armed assault in June 2014.
The list of 15 heroes announced this week also includes an Oregon boy who drowned trying unsuccessfullyl to save his younger brother’s life. Alexander Smith jumped into the Row River upstream from a 15-foot waterfall to try to save his 13-year-old brother, Christian, on July 1, 2014. Both boys were carried over the falls and drowned.
The Carnegie Medals are named for Pittsburgh steel magnate and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. He was inspired to endow an award in his name by stories of heroism during a coal mine disaster in 1904 that killed 181 people, including a miner and an engineer who died trying to rescue others.
Winners of Carnegie Medals formally announced Tuesday:
— Christopher Brooks King, 29, of Roswell, New Mexico, rescued a 38-year-old woman from a burning home in January 2014.
— Martin V. Hohenstein, 51, of Dakota City, Nebraska, rescued a 40-year-old from a burning vehicle that crashed in May 2014.
— Lester J. Trafford III, 55, of Hampton Bays, New York, saved a 42-year-old man from drowning and attempted to save an 85-year-old man when their commercial fishing boat capsized in the Atlantic Ocean in May 2013.
— Craig Randleman, 50, of Bend, Oregon, and Thomas Joy, 28, of Spokane, Washington, rescued an 8-year-old boy from attacking pit bulls in Spokane in April 2014. Joy and Jason Connerley, 28, also of Spokane, then rescued Randleman.
— Robert A. Pritchard Jr., 13, of Jacksonville, Florida, rescued a 6-year-old girl from a burning mobile home in June 2014.
— Michael D. Campbell, 30, of Hamilton, Ohio, rescued a 21-year-old man from a house that exploded and burned because of a natural gas leak in June 2014.
— S. Alexander Smith, 16, of Aloha, Oregon, drowned trying to rescue his 13-year-old brother from drowning in the Row River in Dorena, Oregon, in July 2014.
— Cheryl A. Crecelius, 46, of Gaston, Oregon, saved a 25-year-old man and helped save another from a crashed burning vehicle in March 2014.
— Jamison S. Koczan, 38, of Winter Park, Florida, and Kimberly Lynn Groves, 52, of Winter Springs, Florida, saved a woman from being assaulted at gunpoint in a parked vehicle in Winter Park in June 2014.
— Meghan O’Reilly-Green, 31, of Perth Amboy, New Jersey, helped save a 26-year-old man from drowning in the surf at Hatteras, North Carolina, in July 2013.
— Clinton D. Blackburn, 44, of Morehead, Kentucky, saved a 56-year-old jailer from assault by a prisoner he was transporting in Bardstown, Kentucky, in March 2014.
— McKenzie McKay Guffey, 39, of Gainesboro, Tennessee, saved a 45-year-old man from burning in a crashed vehicle in Rye, New York, in July 2014.
— Ryan Thomas Nelson, 21, of Eagan, Minnesota, saved a 21-year-old man from burning in a home in Grand Forks, North Dakota, in March 2014.
— Alan Cavener, 54, of Nampa, Idaho, rescued an elderly man from an out-of-control vehicle in Meridian, Idaho, in August 2013.
— Bryon Snyder, 36, of Topeka, Kansas, saved a 44-year-old woman from an armed assault in June 2014.