USAF School of Aerospace Medicine graduating class legacy donation puts blind kids on bikes

  • Published
  • By Bryan Ripple
  • 88th Air Base Wing Public Affairs
WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Ohio --  As the medical team walked down the hallway with Capt. Eric Miller's son Garrett and turned the corner, it would become a turning point in the lives of Miller's entire family.

In light of Miller's personal family tragedy and the loss of two family members by two other students who graduated April 13 from United States Air Force School of Aerospace Medicine Flight Nurse and Aeromedical Evacuation Technician Course, Class 2016D, the class of 29 students wanted to leave the school with a legacy gift with a meaning more impactful than that of a traditional plaque or some other token to be displayed in a trophy case. They donated two tandem bicycles to the Ohio State School for the Blind in Columbus.

"We wanted to have a legacy gift that not only showed the foundation of respect and admiration we have for the cadre, but one that would have a lasting impact not only for USAFSAM, but also for the state of Ohio," said Miller, a flight nurse with the 187th Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron, Cheyenne, Wyoming. "It's also fitting because here in the birthplace of aviation, the Wright Brothers built bicycles before they built airplanes."

Miller shared a personal story of resilience through his family's experience with tragedy as context for the classes' choice to donate the tandem bicycles to the school for the blind. Miller explained that on June 22, 2000, he skipped a mandatory meeting at work to watch his son Garrett play T-ball.

"Garrett was playing catcher that afternoon," said Miller. "In T-ball, the catcher simply puts the ball on a tee for a batter to hit. Except on that evening, suddenly Garrett could not find the tee to put the ball back on. Later, while running past third base for home plate, he tripped and fell."

A couple seemingly innocuous events, but they were signs of bad news soon to come.

"A week before that, Garrett had thrown up once and complained of a headache - really just singular episodes, but nothing that indicated anything was really wrong," Miller continued to explain.

The next day, Miller was at a gym on an exercise bike prepping for his race season when he received a call that no parent ever wants to get - a call to come to the emergency room right away. His wife and son had just been taken to a quiet room.

"I worked in that emergency room, and I know what it means when you go to the quiet room," said Miller.

When he arrived at the emergency department, the nurses that he worked with and other staff members were crying.

"I knew something was desperately wrong. They showed me a picture of the CT scan and my son had a golf ball-sized tumor called a medulloblastoma in the back of his head."

By 11 p.m., the family had driven to a children's hospital in Denver where a surgeon met with them to discuss Garrett's impending surgery.

"At 11 a.m. the next day, I will never forget the anesthesiologist holding my beautiful son as he looked upon my face for the last time," Miller said, his voice trembling. "The tumor was successfully removed, but Garrett was blind, mute, paralyzed and on a ventilator for several days. He then endured eight weeks of radiation therapy and 64 weeks of chemotherapy."

Over the next two-and-a-half years, Garrett learned to walk and talk again, but he never recovered his sight.

"Months after all of the treatment, I remember him coming home and saying, 'Mom, I'm forgetting what things look like.' He wouldn't go out and play with his friends. He would now just sit in the house."

Miller said that he read a story about a man who was blind and was racing tandem bicycles at a high level of competition.

"I mentioned to Garrett about us getting a tandem bicycle to ride like the man he read about. He couldn't quite grasp the concept of a bike where the man would sit on the front, steer the bike while blind, and use a cane. I told Garrett, that's not how it works."
But on Dec. 3, 2000 he got his chance. Several individuals and a corporation donated a tandem bike to Garrett.

"I remember as Garrett put his hands on the handlebars in the front, and then his hands went down to the first seat, but it was when his hands went down to the handlebars and the second seat-- it was like a light bulb -I had my son back," Miller said with a smile. "We are very grateful to the people who donated that bike."

In February 2001, Miller began a non-profit foundation to buy tandem bicycles for blind and low-vision children.

"Since then we've put kids on bikes in over 43 states and eight different countries. We've also started a program to put two tandem bikes in every state blind school in the country and we only have 14 left to go."

The students of class 2016D discussed ideas for a legacy gift and Miller suggested getting a bike for the Ohio State School for the Blind. The class proceeded to raise a significant amount of money to buy one of the tandems.

"I was in the process of buying another bike for a little girl in Orlando on the same day we ordered our bike for the school for the blind. Due to a shipping error, we ended up with two tandems."

Because of the cost in time, effort and funding to reroute the second tandem, Miller suggested the class go ahead and donate both bikes to the Ohio State School for the Blind. One of the bikes will be donated on behalf of and in honor of the USAFSAM cadre. The second bike will be donated in honor of two students in the class who unexpectedly lost family members during the time the class was in session.

For more information about Miller's non-profit foundation that donates tandem bicycles to blind children or those with low vision, visit www.rushmillerfoundation.org or the Ohio State School for the Blind at www.ossb.oh.gov/.