Carnegie Hero Fund President Eric Zahren presented the Carnegie Medal to City of Asylum co-founder Ralph Henry Reese at a private ceremony held Sunday, March 8, at Alphabet City in Pittsburgh.
Reese was awarded the medal in September after he and Patrick Haskin helped rescue novelist Salman Rushdie from an attempted assassination on Aug. 12, 2022, in Chautauqua, New York.
During a morning lecture, Rushdie, 75, was seated on an amphitheater stage preparing to speak at an event when a 24-year-old man with a knife ran up onto the stage and attacked, stabbing Rushdie repeatedly. Rushdie stood and attempted to flee, but fell to the ground as the assailant leaped on top of him to continue his assault.
Seated on the stage with Rushdie was Reese, 73, from Pittsburgh. He responded to the attack immediately along with event supervisor Patrick Haskin, 30, of Mayville, New York, and a communications director, both responding from backstage. The director ran at the assailant and dove, striking the assailant with his shoulder, knocking him off-balance and distracting him briefly. Meanwhile, Reese charged the assailant and held his legs down. At some point, Reese suffered a stab wound above his right eye, and the assailant managed to keep his upper body free to continue his attack on Rushdie.
Haskin saw the assailant still had the knife and punched his arm in an unsuccessful attempt to loosen the assailant’s grip of the weapon. Haskin then laid on the assailant’s upper body to hold him down. Rushdie was able to move a few feet away, out of the assailant’s reach, as he lay bleeding on the floor. Others from the audience responded, including a man who sat on the assailant’s back and held down his arm possessing the knife. Someone else managed to remove the knife from the assailant’s grasp and handed it off to someone in the audience area.
On-site police soon responded to take the assailant into custody. The assailant was found guilty in state court of attempted murder and assault. He was sentenced to 25 years in prison. Rushdie was flown to a hospital for his injuries, including 15 stab wounds, some of which required surgery. One wound blinded his right eye permanently. Reese was taken by ambulance to a hospital, where he was treated for the wound above his eye. He recovered. Haskin was not injured.
Zahren spoke about the similarities between the work of the Hero Fund and Reese’s work at the City of Asylum, a haven where endangered creatives can continue to be heard.
“Dark and light are ever present in our neighborhoods and in our world,” Zahren said. “The darkest places can always be overcome by the light of our better angels. But it requires a hard-fought understanding that we are the help that’s coming. We are the better angels of civilization, present and available, as hope to those around us, even strangers.”
Reese was honored to receive the medal and felt it was personally very dear to him. He followed by speaking on the culture of responsibility.
“Responsibility is something we learn from one another and share together. That day in Chautauqua I was not alone. Many of you were there and rushed the stage to help,” Reese said. “Momentary acts of responsibility like Chautauqua, like defending Salman Rushdie, depend on a culture and a like-minded community of support, and I want to thank you for your help and your care.”
Established in 2004 by Reese and Diane Samuels, City of Asylum provides sanctuary to endangered writers and artists, so that they can continue to create and their voices are not silenced.