The Walt Kyle Mile has evolved in its six years of raising funds for the Beacon House, the hospitality house for patients receiving medical care and their loved ones.

What started out as a walk has become a walk, a 5K run and a dance-walk to support the cancer patients at Beacon House.

These events take place Saturday morning in Marquette and there is still time to become involved in this most worthy effort.

Every year, Coach Kyle and his team, the Northern Michigan University hockey Wildcats, lead the walk portion, which starts at the Berry Events Center and weaves through town and along the beautiful shores of Lake Superior. The walk has three length options – one, two or three miles – meaning there is a distance even those who don’t walk often can handle.

This year, the Walt Kyle Mile – sponsored by River Valley Bank – also includes a dance-walk being headed up by the NMU Dance Team, who will lead some coordinated routines, set to lively music. But dance-walk participants can also bust their own moves, making this portion of the fundraiser a chance for some self expression.

The 5K run portion is sponsored by Fellow Flowers, the running movement, and starts right with the walk portion and morphs into a timed run with prizes for females and males by age group.

This 5K dash is being done in memory of Kristen O’Halloran, a beautiful young woman from Ontario, Canada, who battled cancer starting at the age of 7. She died in 2008 at the age of 25 but The Determined Angel to Sustain Hope – DASH – Foundation was established in her memory to support causes like Beacon House.

We salute Walt Kyle, cancer survivor, for doing something wonderful for the community each year with this event in his name.

We thank Beacon House for providing a much needed service to people who are in the battle for their lives and all those who volunteer to help this wonderful facility continue.

And we encourage all those who are able to come out Saturday to participate. Registration the day of the event is from 8-8:30 a.m. at the Berry Events Center at $15 per walker and dance-walker and $25 for runner.

All proceeds go to support the many cancer patients who stay at Beacon House while they are in Marquette for chemotherapy or radiation treatments, a most worthy cause indeed.

For more information, visit upbeaconhouse.org.