By Pam Hersh
Mother’s Day brings a tear and a smile to Princetonian Lynne Cannon, the mother of Kate “Katie” Cannon.
The tears are due to the fact Katie – Dr. Kathryn Cannon Hughes, an obstetrician-gynecologist and herself a mother of two toddlers – died in November 2017 at the age of 36 from acute lymphoblastic leukemia.
A broad smile joins the tears on Lynne’s face, however, whenever she thinks about how Katie‘s “extraordinary giving nature” is still alive and thriving – thanks to charitable programs established to carry on Katie’s mission in life to help others.
Katie was always a “giver,” said Lynne, a local corporate leader in the area of human resource management.
“I would like to claim that I influenced my daughter, but the truth is that I learned from her about the joy and fulfillment of giving,” said Lynne, who for decades has held board leadership positions for several local nonprofits, including RWJ Barnabas University Hospital in New Brunswick and Hamilton, and Mercer County Community College Foundation.
Lynne worked with Katie – and then without Katie – to establish the legacy funds that will carry on Katie’s passion for supporting her community on both the local and global level. These charitable initiatives are starting to blossom this spring – coincidently, right around Mother’s Day.
The Dr. Katherine Lynne Cannon Cancer Fund residing within the RWJ Barnabas Hamilton Foundation was established in 2017 by Katie during her own battle with leukemia.
Within the next few weeks, the fund will start actively supporting families of acute stage cancer patients who are underserved and disadvantaged. For patients receiving treatment at the RWJ Barnabas Hamilton Cancer Center, the fund’s resources will be used for services such as transportation, nutritional food supplements, childcare, cosmetic enhancements and spare clothing for use during treatment.
As a professional with a medical degree, a master’s degree and a bachelor’s degree, Katie wanted to help not only needy individuals with health care challenges, but also needy individuals with higher education aspirations.
The Dr. Katherine Lynne Cannon Financial Aid Program at The Lawrenceville School, from which Katie graduated cum laude in 1999, was launched officially on May 3 at the 20th reunion celebratory dinner. Lynne Cannon spoke about how the financial aid stipend would target disadvantaged students from the inner city.
“The women in our family had a real understanding of and connection to inner city residents. I was born in Newark, Katie was born in Newark and Katie’s grandmother – my mother – was born in Newark. Her aunts grew up in Newark. We called ourselves the Women of Ferry Street. Before Katie died, she and I talked about writing a Ferry Street women memoir based upon a college entrance essay Katie wrote. This scholarship program may inspire me to do that memoir,” Lynne said.
Two medical profession support initiatives in Katie’s honor are the OB-GYN Medical Resident Award at RWJ Barnabas Hospital in Livingston and the Support for Women Physicians at Cooper University Hospital.
“During August of 2018, the RWJ Barnabas Livingston OB-GYN Medical Residency Program presented an award to a medical resident in Dr. Katherine Lynne Cannon’s honor. Her qualities of ‘enthusiasm, congeniality, and heart and spirit’ were recognized by Dr. Michael Miller, chairman of the OB-GYN Department and the OB-GYN team. His words really captured Katie’s essence,” Lynne said.
No matter how busy Katie was with her academic or extracurricular activities (she was a competitive figure skater), she never lost her commitment to help others. She exhibited this trait in the “most ridiculous and profound ways,” her mother said.
One so-called ridiculous way was her spending habits in the Starbucks near the Brown University campus.
“I really got annoyed to find that in 2001, while a sophomore at Brown University, Katie seemed to be abusing her debit card by stopping into Starbucks for ‘whatever’ two and three times a day. I noted that this amount on some days reached $40 with a resulting overdraft. When I confronted her and complained about her terribly addictive Starbucks habit, Katie gave the disarmingly charming response: ‘Oh no, I’m not addicted, I just guess I seem to pay for anyone with me when I stop in … you know, Mommy, the way you do it.’”
The profound ways Katie demonstrated her giving nature spanned the course of her short lifetime. The theme of her giving consistently focused on the impoverished and underserved, and women’s health.
As a teenager, she volunteered for the Trenton Habitat for Humanity, the Mercer Street Friends, Trenton Soup Kitchen and the Red Cross. Her high school academic projects at Lawrenceville School involved studying the health needs of the underserved across three continents. During her years at Brown University, she participated in a United Nations internship and World Health Organization project in Geneva. Her major volunteer project during 2004-05 was for the Rhode Island Commission on Women.
“All of this paved the way for Katie’s career as an OB-GYN devoted to helping others, particularly women…,” said Lynne.
“When Katie entered the world, she had joy in her face,” she continued. “I knew from the day she was born she was a force of nature. And my job now is to make sure that this force remains strong and is the source of a gift that keeps on giving” on this Mother’s Day and every day of the year for many years to come.
