The memory of Diamond Marshall, the nine-year-old Calgary girl who succumbed to cancer earlier this week, will live on in a charitable fund established to research childhood cancers.
Diamond suffered from a rare form of adrenal cancer, the same strain of the disease that she had beaten three times before.
The girl made headlines back in 2011 when her wish to the Children’s Wish Foundation to meet a real princess came true. Diamond was there when the newly married Prince William and Kate Middleton, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, arrived in Calgary on July 7.
She presented Kate with a bouquet of flowers and gave her a hug – a gesture captured by media around the world, catapulting the girl into the international spotlight.
Diamond’s family has now established the Diamond Shine Fund to help answer questions about childhood cancers and help affected children around the world.
“When she wasn’t being a princess, our little girl liked to say that her superhero name was ‘Diamond Shine’. This was certainly fitting, since she had the power to light up any room with just the twinkle in her eye,” her family said in a statement released on Thursday.
They say they hope the fund will make sure that fewer families will have to endure the loss they have suffered.
Diamond’s father, Lyall Marshall, says that his own family is donating $100,000 to start the fund, but he wants it to be much, much bigger. “We are asking the community to help us reach our goal of $10M,” he said in a statement.
Donations are being accepted online by the Alberta Children’s Hospital Foundation.
Contributions can also be made over the phone by calling 403-955-8818 from Monday to Friday, between 8:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m.
