Joe Hall of the Ohio-based nonprofit Whole Across America is walking across the country to raise awareness of the mental health crisis and suicide prevention, and he made a stop outside the Indiana State Capitol in Indianapolis, his first visit to the state capital to raise awareness of the mental health crisis and suicide prevention.
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A man who is traveling across the country and visiting state capitals to raise awareness about mental health crises and suicide prevention recently passed through Columbus and North Vernon.
Joe Hall, an Ohio resident and founder of the nonprofit group Hall Across the Country, recently visited Indianapolis and has since been walking several miles each day, visiting Greenfield, Franklin, Edinburgh and Columbus.
Hall said on social media that he was treated for blisters on his feet at Columbus Regional Hospital and spent Saturday night over Memorial Day weekend at Columbus Fire Department Fire Station 4 on 25th Street. He planned to remain in Columbus on Tuesday before traveling south to North Vernon and then on to the next state capital, Frankfort, Kentucky.
This is Hall’s second transcontinental walk, having begun in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, in May 2022 and finished in San Francisco in November of the same year.
Hall said he was inspired to take on the cause after a friend’s son committed suicide. His second walk aims to engage with leaders in the lower 48 state capitals. It was Hall’s first time visiting a state capital, as he set off from his home in Fairborn, Ohio, and walked to Indianapolis. “One down. 47 to go,” he posted on Facebook.
Hall said the walk would also help raise funds for the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI).
