A simple text asking to borrow a tie-dye shirt would turn out to be much more than junior Sam Biondo thought.
Yesterday, JC students wore tye-die t-shirts under their uniform in honor of Mike Sawyer, a Havre de Grace High School student who passed away after drowning in the Susquehanna River.
According to Biondo, she as well as her brother, John Biondo, were close friends with those who tried to save Mike Sawyer the day he passed away. According to the Havre de Grace Patch, Mike drowned on Saturday, May 28 in the Susquehanna River.
When Sam heard of the tie-dye shirt day that everyone at Havre de Grace was planning in honor of Mike from her friend’s text message, she decided that she would try to get the JC community involved as well.
“I’m not 100 percent sure if I was the first to tell JC students to wear tie-dye shirts for Mike because I know there are other students who know Havre de Grace kids and who live in Havre de Grace. However, I sent out texts and posted on Facebook asking people to wear tie-dye to honor Mike. I wanted to do all that I could to get as many people as possible to show support for all Mike’s friends and family,” Biondo said.
According to Sam, she found out later from her brother that students from Havre de Grace were originally going to wear black shirts, but they remembered that Mike did not like the color black, and so they settled on tie-dye.
Sam’s brother was one of the students from Havre de Grace High School who helped organize a candlelight vigil at the lighthouse in Havre de Grace to remember Mike.
“I didn’t know him, but I have a lot of friends who knew him and who are mourning his loss. Havre de Grace is such a tight knit community, and Mike’s loss has greatly impacted all of us, especially the youth of the community,” Biondo said.
“All [of] his friends are raising money to help pay for his funeral and to [help] pay to put up no swimming signs around the bay [also]. So if anyone wants to donate, there’s a group on Facebook made by my brother’s friend, Amy Frank.”
Grace Kim is a managing editor for “The Patriot” and jcpatriot.com.