Pat Swan Works Tirelessly Against Cancer

Try keeping up with Pat Swan.

Thursday, before tonight's Lilburn Relay Rally, you'd have found the retired critical care nurse from Lilburn being her tireless, 73-year-old self, distributing workers' T-shirts and assigning camp sites for the city's biggest cancer fundraiser.

Waking before dawn, she'd been on the go -- from Gwinnett's American Cancer Society office at one point, to shopping for supplies for tonight's event, to attending a sorority meeting until 10 p.m., then bed around midnight.

"I don't know anybody with the energy she has," said Lilburn City Clerk Kathy Maner, a friend of Swan's for years. "She's a very energetic, selfless lady, one of the best people I know."

Dedicated to raising funds to eradicate cancer, Swan was named by Lilburn Mayor Diana Preston a co-chairman of tonight's event in City Park downtown. The seventh annual rally benefits Friday's all-night Gwinnett Relay for Life  at the Gwinnett Fairgrounds, and ultimately, the American Cancer Society's fight to find a cure.

A fair-style walk-a-thon, tonight's rally from 5:30 to 10 p.m. already has attracted an expected 140 participants and 13 teams of walkers and likely will raise more than $20,000. Last year's Lilburn rally raised more than $23,000, the most of any Gwinnett city for the county event that expected this year to involve some 10,000 participants from 500 teams and generate more than $2 million.

In rallies like Lilburn's, teams of people camp out at and take turns walking around City Park's half-mile gravel path. Teams members take turns walking throughout, and in addition to having sought financial sponsors, local businesses operate booths and share their proceeds.

About 70 cancer survivors are expected to come walk an inaugural lap, then be treated to a special reception. Bagged luminaries commemorating cancer victims and survivors light the path into the evening.

“It's about being a community that takes up the fight against cancer,” Swan told Lilburn Patch when the crescendo to tonight's event began in February.

A 35-year resident of Lilburn, Swan has reason to challenge cancer. Her daughter survived breast cancer 12 years ago, and her husband of 53 years has conquered skin cancer. Swan's father died from lung cancer in the early 1980s, something she said sparked her devotion to cancer fundraising.

Ten years ago, Swan began answering phones as a volunteer at Atlanta's Hope House for cancer patients, and she still does so on Tuesdays. Among her favorite events is helping a women's group stage a fashion show that raises more than $100,000 to combat breast cancer. Among her most pensive roles is being on Gwinnett's Department of Family and Child Services board. Among her most difficult perhaps is lobbying legislators to heighten tobacco tax.

"Some people work a regular 40 or 50 hours a week, but Pat's volunteerism is at least that," said Preston, a friend of Swan's for 30-plus years. "You have to call her early in the morning if you want to catch her. She's one of those community people giving back every day of her life."

Megan Heisel, a Cancer Society community manager in Gwinnett, has known Swan for less than a year, but feels her initiative contageous.

"If Pat can do it, I can, too," Heisel said of a sense Swan exudes. "She has her hand in everything."

Swan is empowered by volunteering.

"I'm very lucky. I don't take very much sleep," she said. "I'm up at 6 a.m. and am out most of the day. I think if I ever stop, there won't be any more Pat Swan."