HAMILTON — A Hamilton organization took to the streets Saturday to bring awareness and support to children. The event ran Friday through Saturday and runners logged a lot of miles.
One hundred miles and as many reasons why. Emma’s House started in 2006 and has since been changing the lives of children in Montana who are faced with abuse, trauma, neglect—and sometimes all three.
"It's set up kind of like a home, so instead of going somewhere scary like a police station or a hospital, they can go to this home environment with Twila their support dog, and tell their story once in a kind of more comfortable environment. If they need a medical exam, it can happen there, and then they do offer counseling as well," said Sarah Savoie, Run 4 Emma's House Race Director.
Run for Emma’s House is a 2 or 4-mile race where all the proceeds go to the organization. But there were some special people able to go the extra mile for Emma’s House. Ryan Tellock set out on a 100-mile run. Ryan said he has lived a blessed life and Emma’s House is his way of giving to those who don’t have the kind of support he did.
"I'm very passionate about Emma’s House because what they, what they do, makes a serious impact in our community for our youth that are that are put under very difficult living situations," he said. "So, you know, again it goes back to how fortunate I've been in my life, so they really help people with that."
Lyric Johnson ran the first 52 miles with Ryan in support of the organization and echoed a similar sentiment.
"I definitely wanted to be involved and this house has always kind of been special in our community, so I felt like it was pretty important and decided to kind of just go for it," said Johnson.
Emma’s House holds a special place in the heart of those in the community.
"We wanted to really emphasize kind of the community involvement, and you know Emma’s house serves the whole, you know Ravalli County, and there's so many people that go into making this possible and we just wanted to have that community involvement," said Savoie.
In their inaugural year, the race had over 70 participants and Ryan raised more than $31,000 by running his race. The event still has its fundraising page open for more donations towards Emma’s House. The Run 4 Emma’s House race is the true meaning of going the distance.
If you want to support Emma’s House or learn more about the organization you can visit their website.
