A 19-year-old Hamilton man has been awarded a Carnegie Medal after rescuing a man from a burning tent at a homeless encampment.
Ezekiel (Zeke) Fox was among 18 award recipients in the latest cohort announced on June 22.
Fox was driving near Bayfront Park in Hamilton, Ont., on Jan. 5, 2025, when he noticed smoke and then saw a tent go up in flames and heard screaming.
A 17-year-old student at the time, Fox drove into a parking lot next to the park and got out to investigate, later pulling Shawn Goodwin, 53, from the tent, saving his life.
“It was kind of a fight or flight, you know, normal reaction, … and I just went in the tent and looked for a little bit to find Mr. Goodwin,” Fox told The Epoch Times.
“Going into that tent, there is nothing that I was feeling other than I need to get this guy out of here,” he said.
“I didn’t do it for the spotlight. I did it just because it’s the right thing to do.”
Fox found Goodwin about seven feet from the door under a burning tarp and tried to grab his arms, but they were burned, so he grabbed Goodwin under the arms and, walking backward, dragged him out as flames engulfed the tent, according to the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission.
He rolled Goodwin, who was on fire, in the snow to put out the flames, before both men were transported to hospital—Goodwin for his burns and Fox for smoke inhalation.
Fox, the eldest of three siblings, was influenced by the help his family always provided to his younger brother who has autism, he told The Epoch Times.
“Helping others and putting others before myself has always been extremely important to me, and seeing my brother struggle and my parents struggle, I went into personal care work,” he said.
Fox now works with adults and young kids who have a variety of physical and emotional conditions—work that he says has helped him prepare for the challenges of a future career in law enforcement.
He says that whether someone is homeless or experiencing addiction would not factor into his motivation to help.
“People forget that that is a person. It’s a person in need, and that’s where that drive came from,” Fox said.
“Everyone’s fighting their own battles. Some people fight them in the dark with no one there to help, and it’s important to just, you know, as my mother and father always said when they dropped me off at school, always be respectful.”
The Carnegie Medal in a file photo. Courtesy of the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission
Fox was one of only two Canadians in the latest cohort of awardees, the other being Matthew Baxter of Saint John, N.B., who rescued a boy from drowning in the cold water of the Little River Reservoir off the nearby beach at a city park, according to his award entry page.
The Carnegie Medal for Heroism is awarded annually to individuals in Canada or the United States who enter extreme danger while saving or attempting to save others’ lives, says the website of the U.S.-based Carnegie Hero Fund Commission. To date, 10,581 individuals have received the Carnegie Medal since the establishment of the Pittsburgh-based fund in 1904 by industrialist-philanthropist Andrew Carnegie.
Recipients of the Carnegie Medal for Heroism receive various forms of financial support, including a grant of up to US$5,500 and scholarships and other assistance for those who are disabled or for the families of those who lost their lives in the act of heroism.
To date, nearly US$47 million has been awarded through the fund.
