Landmark Pathway Planned to Honor Selfless Americans

A landmark similar to Hollywood’s Walk of Fame is planned for the nation’s capital to honor Americans who gave of themselves to help others.

The Extra Mile pathway will consist of at least 70 bronze medallions, each 3 1/2 feet in diameter, embedded in sidewalks along a 10-block area near the White House. Each medallion will bear the name, likeness and background of the honoree.

The project is a centerpiece of the Points of Light Foundation, a nonprofit group spawned in 1990 by former President Bush’s vision of creating a legion of volunteers “spread like stars, like a thousand points of light.”

Plans call for a dedication in 2003, although the project still has to raise $2 million of the estimated $3 million needed. The project has received about $192,000 in federal funds.

The pathway’s first hand-sculpted medallion, honoring the Rev. Edgar J. Helms, a Methodist minister who started Goodwill Industries International, was scheduled for unveiling today. Others in the first group include the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and suffragette Susan B. Anthony.