More than 350 cancer survivors and guests were treated to a chicken barbecue provided by volunteer staff from Cornell's School of Hotel Administration and the Statler Hotel at the American Cancer Society's annual Relay for Life fund-raiser July 13. A relay team featuring over a dozen school and Statler employees also participated in the overnight event, raising more than $2,600 of the $150,000 pledged this year.

The Relay for Life event, held at the Lansing High School track, started Friday at 6 p.m. with the release of dozens of white doves and a "survivor's lap"; at 10 p.m., a candlelight procession began on the darkened track, and participants lit hundreds of luminarias lining the inside racing lane in remembrance of loved ones who died from cancer. The latter event was the most somber period of an otherwise festive evening that included a performance by the Ithaca Community Chorus and an "Ithaca Idol" contest.

The Relay for Life celebrates survivorship, raises money and brings together those who have been touched by cancer. Relay teams take turns walking or running laps, with each team trying to keep at least one team member on the track at all times. Walkers continued apace throughout the chilly night, the last of them finishing their commitments at 8 a.m.

Cornell volunteers also were on hand throughout the relay providing free bottles of water to members of the 75 teams that participated in the event.

Vendors donating items for Friday night's dinner included Cornell Laundry, Horwitz Supply, Ithaca Bakery, Ithaca Produce, Maines Paper & Food Service Inc., The Image Press and Wildflowers.

Connections between Cornell and the American Cancer Society are not new: The American Cancer Society has contributed more than $7 million through 23 separate grants to fund Cornell research in the past decade, both at the Ithaca campus and at Weill Cornell Medical College. For the past several years, Cornell and Ithaca College students have held their own Relay for Life event each April. This year, more than 2,000 students participated and raised $215,000. Also, an annual daffodil sale, in which Cornell students sell daffodils on campus and in the community, raises another $20,000 each year.

In addition, more than 300 people signed up to participate in a landmark new American Cancer Society study, the Cancer Prevention Study-3 (CPS-3). This is a confidential, 20-year volunteer study designed to study the links between lifestyle and cancer development. Men and women between the ages of 30 and 65 who have no personal history of cancer are eligible; the goal is to enroll 500,000 adults from various racial-ethnic backgrounds from across the United States. Through the CPS-3, as well as through the relay itself, participants, supporters, friends and family can make a difference in the fight against cancer. While it was the cancer society's third CPS study, it marked the first time that enrollment was conducted through the Relay for Life.