By Joe Calamito
Recently on my daily walk through my neighborhood, I met two dynamic and interesting ladies, Sharon Romano and Marie Costantino placing gold bows on the poles in Bayonne, I am always looking to help promote someone or an organization in our River View Observer digital issue, so I asked the ladies what they were doing, and what was the significance of the Gold bows?
Here is what they told me…
September is Childhood cancer Awareness Month and we advocate for the many children who are battling this disease, the ones who are survivors and life with side effects and those angels who sadly were taken from us way too soon.
We both lost our sons to cancer .
Sharon continued, her son is Anthony Costantino and mine is Michael Romano . Both boys went through the Bayonne Public Schools and played Cal Ripken Baseball despite their illness.
There are about 15,000 children diagnosed with cancer each year in the US alone.
We set out on a Mission a few years ago to support this cause in Memory of our sons.
We hang gold boys throughout the town and we have gained the support of the Bayonne Board of Education and each year on the last Friday of the month the District will allow staff and students to wear Gold to support two wonderful Pediatric Cancer
Foundations; Tomorrows Children’s Fund at Hackensack Meridian and The Valerie Fund of New Jersey. City Hall gives their support and will do a flag raising on September 25, 2026 at 4:15pm .
The town of Bayonne truly comes together to support this important cause .
On October 9, 2026 there will be a charity softball game which will support the above named hospitals to assist patients and their families financially . Bayonne’s town heroes Police and Fire Departments and members of the Bayonne Board of Education will play each other . Our Buddy Baseball team will also support and play a few innings to show their support. Their will be some raffles and donations will be accepted at the game. The game will start at 5pm .
We call ourselves Two Moms on a Mission .
We won’t stop until a cure is found.
No child fights alone. ?
Next week we will have photos and more about the October 9th Charity softball game and we hope this post will inspire the good folks of Bayonne to come out and support these two Mom’s on a Mission.
