ALS ‘Ice Bucket Challenge’ founder Pat Quinn delivers posthumous farewell

Six months after his death, Pat Quinn, the plucky Yonkers man who helped catapult the Ice Bucket Challenge for Lou Gehrig’s disease into a social media phenomena, returned to his alma mater, Iona College.

Quinn, who died from the disease also known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, gave an impassioned, pre-recorded keynote address at the virtual ceremony, telling the teary-eyed Class of ’21, “My message to you is that life isn’t about getting hit and hiding in a corner. Life is a challenge – it’s meant to be.” “I want you to think about how you fight and what you’re going to do when the fight doesn’t go your way.” Quinn, who died November at age 37, told graduates in the speech, streamed by the private Catholic college in New Rochelle on May 23.