The annual parade will create flower portraits of 60 organ donors from across the country.
PASADENA, Calif. -- Three late New Jersey residents will be among 60 honored in flower form on the 2016 Donate Life float in the Rose Bowl parade on New Year's Day.
Each year, the organ donation organization and the affiliated NJ Sharing Network create the likenesses of donors from across the country out of flowers, petals, and seeds. 2016 will mark the 127th annual Rose Parade, which Donate Life has participated in for the past 13 years. Its float features "flora graph" portraits of late donors, and riders include living donors and organ recipients.
"The act of organ and tissue donation weaves together a tapestry of donors and recipients, of hope and remembrance, and beloved family and friends who live on through the most miraculous of gifts," Tom Mone, Chairman of the Donate Life float committee, said in a release about the event.
The New Jersey honorees include:
- Betsy Niles: A Montclair mom and children's book author who died in March 2011 after being struck by a van while on her way to the Montclair train station. Niles's kidney was donated to Valentine Samuels, 53, of Newark.
- Andrew Jova: The Brick Township 17-year-old was killed in a 2008 car accident. His organs were donated to five people.
- Robert McCullion: A Toms River dad and tech industry professional who became a tissue and cornea donor when he died in 2014 at age 68.
Friends, family members, and donation recipients have gathered over the past several months to help put together the floragraphs, and many will travel to Pasadena to take part in the parade.
"My son is a hero," Jennifer Jova said in a statement about her son, Andrew.
"To me, it means so much that Andrew will not be forgotten. I know my son is being remembered and thought of and thanked."
In addition, two others from New Jersey - living donor Donna Albanese, of Scotch Plains, who donated her kidney to her mother and Mark Meade, a heart donation recipient from Princeton Junction - will take part in the parade, as well. The floragraphs will be accompanied by 24 organ recipients and 12 living donors.
The process, recipients said, is a good way to thank the families of the people who saved their lives.
"I wanted them to know how grateful I am for the kidney and how it has changed my life," Samuels said in a release.
"They have given me new life."
The Rose Parade kicks off at 8 a.m. on Jan. 1.
Jessica Mazzola may be reached at jmazzola@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @JessMazzola. Find NJ.com on Facebook.