Indiana organ donor Justin Langford to be honored at 2019 Rose Parade
WHITESTOWN, Ind. (WISH) — People paused in the lobby of New Hope Christian Church as they arrived for Sunday services to gaze at a portrait of Justin Langford.
The “floragraph” — a collage made entirely of organic material including seeds, spices and flowers — almost perfectly captured Langford’s face and smile, his father Bryan said. Except for the eyes.
A framed photograph of the 23-year-old stood next to the floragraph. His eyes are blue-green, not sesame seed brown, and sparkling with life.
Langford, a 2009 graduate of Zionsville High School, died in May 2014.
He had graduated from Vanderbilt University the previous year with a mechanical engineering degree and was planning to propose to his longtime girlfriend, Kelsi Buckley. He bought a ring and spent nearly a year designing a website commemorating their relationship, his parents said.
It all began his senior year of high school; Kelsi had gone to his senior prom. She just wasn’t his date, his father added with a laugh.
Langford never got to pop the question. His life was cut short by a vehicle accident.
But a question he had been asked years earlier — as a teenager at the Bureau of Motor Vehicles — lay the groundwork for the legacy he left behind. Langford answered “yes” to becoming an organ donor.
“It’s not something people really think about but he didn’t hesitate to sign up,” Bryan Langford told News 8. “He said, ‘Of course. Why wouldn’t I?’ It was something he knew he wanted to do.”
Langford’s contributions as an organ donor saved the lives of five people and extended or improved the lives of more than 20 others. A photo of three of them — a man who received a kidney and pancreas, a man who received his heart and a toddler who received his other kidney — was displayed beside the unfinished floragraph.
“We’ll fill in his eyebrows today,” his mother Janice Langford said, pointing at a platter of seeds and glue. “It’s a tribute and a way of raising awareness.”
The floragraph will be featured on the Donate Life Float at the 2019 Rose Parade, where Langford will be recognized as the Indiana Donor Network’s 2019 Floragraph Honoree.
The portrait will be completed during a “finishing event” Sunday afternoon at the Whitestown church.
The public is invited to attend, his parents said.
Open House to Honor Justin Langford
Sunday, November 18 — 2 to 4 p.m.
New Hope Christian Church
5780 S. Main St.
Whitestown, IN 46075