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Friday, February 28, 1997

Three Texans, 14 others honored for heroism

PITTSBURGH (AP) - A railroad supervisor who clobbered a cougar with a wrench, a Texas woman who pulled a man from his pickup moments before a train struck it, and 15 others were honored Thursday for acts of heroism.

The Carnegie Hero Fund Commission awarded $2,500 each and gold medals to residents of the United States and Canada who risked their lives. Awards went to survivors of three winners who died trying to save others.

Steel magnate Andrew Carnegie started the fund in 1904 after he was inspired by tales of heroism in a coal-mining disaster.

Heroes included Dwight Sadek, 39, who heard a co-worker call for help in Creston, British Columbia, on May 25, 1995.

He rushed to a remote railroad track and saw a 55-pound cougar with its mouth latched onto railway mechanic Narinder Mondair's right hand. Neither kicking nor rocks would dislodge the big cat, so Sadek knocked it unconscious with a large wrench from a nearby truck.

Mondair needed extensive repairs to his right hand and spent two weeks in the hospital.

The cougar was unusually thin and may have attacked because it was starving. It was shot after the attack.

Others honored Thursday were:

-Tammy Stone, 35, of Claude, Texas, who pulled a man out of his pickup as a freight train bore down last year in Amarillo, Texas.

-Guillermo Rangel, 36, of Seguin, Texas, who saved a woman and three children from a burning mobile home last year in McQueeney, Texas.

-Gregory Frausto, 30, of Fort Worth, Texas, who disarmed a convenience store robber and rescued a hostage in 1995 in Runaway Bay, Texas.

-Robert Wagner, 41, of St. Clair Shores, Mich., who intervened as a mugger struck a co-worker repeatedly with a brick in a Detroit parking garage in 1994.

-Scott Miller, 29, of Pleasanton, Calif., who pulled an unconscious woman out of a burning house in 1996 in San Carlos, Calif.

-Daniel Kuehl, 44, of St. James, Minn., who pulled a woman out of a car that sank in a flooded field last year in Montevideo, Minn.

-Michael Douty, 18, of Taylors, S.C., who drowned in 1995 as he tried to save a teen-ager from a flooded culvert in Greer, S.C. The teen-ager eventually pulled herself out of the water.

-Alan Laidlaw, 18, of Greenville, S.C., who tried to save Douty but was swept downriver to safety.

-Brentwood Parker, 34, of Whiteville, N.C., who pulled a woman out of a burning car in Whiteville in 1996.

-Jerry Caines, 38, of Riegelwood, N.C., who helped Parker save the woman from the car.

-Michael Davis, 38, of New Berlin, N.Y., who pulled a woman out of a car that ran into a pond last year in Morris, N.Y.

-Deborah Rae O'Shields, 33, of New Castle, Del., who made a cannonball dive through ice in a swimming pool and saved a 7-year-old boy in New Castle in 1995.

-James Cain, 34, of Richmond, Ky., who pulled an infant out of a crib and ran out of a burning house last year in Richmond.

-George Motza Jr., 34, of Germantown, Ohio, who drowned as he tried to save a young boy last year at a spillway in Oxford, Ohio. A fisherman eventually rescued the boy.

-Joseph Dowdy, 75, of Safety Harbor, Fla., who drowned trying to save his grandson from a strong current in the Gulf of Mexico last year near Clearwater, Fla. A lifeguard and others rescued the boy.

-Boyd Gavin, 47, of Hampden, Newfoundland, who pulled a toddler from a burning house in Hampden in 1995. Send a Letter to the Editor about This Story | Start or Join A Discussion about This Story
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