Bentonville, Arkansas, Mayor Stephanie Orman, left, presents the Carnegie Medal to Craig Hinton, the husband of posthumously awarded Carnegie Hero Tawny Hinton, during an Aug. 27 city council meeting.
Tawny Hinton was awarded the medal in March 2024 after she attempted to rescue a young boy from drowning in Bentonville on Aug. 29, 2022. Both Hinton and the boy drowned in the accident.
Two 11-year-old boys were playing near a retention pond when one of them slipped into the water and was pulled through a concrete drainage pipe. The boy’s brother entered the water and reached out to grasp him before the current caused him to lose his footing. He returned to the bank and ran for help. Hinton, 47, was with the boys’ mother at their apartment when the brother told them what happened.
Hinton and the mother ran to the pond and entered the water. Hinton swam in murky water to a fast-moving area near the pipe entrance close to where the boy was last seen. She then submerged to search for the boy before she, ultimately, did not resurface. The mother of the boys attempted to reach Hinton, but was forced to exit the pond due to the strength of the current. Emergency personnel located the boy in a drainage ditch about 500 yards away. He was taken to the hospital, where he was later pronounced dead from drowning. Hinton was located unresponsive 50 feet away from the pond in a storm drain beneath a manhole. She was taken to a hospital, but never regained consciousness before life support was withdrawn five days later. Hinton died of cardiac arrest and complications from drowning.
Although the family has since returned to Craig Hinton’s home country of Canada, they traveled back to Bentonville for the ceremony.
“She’s the type of person who would help anybody,” Craig said in a Sept. 5, 2022, report on the accident.
At the presentation, he was met with a standing ovation from council members and attendees.