I remember participating in this in school, but I couldn't remember what the point was, so I headed over to wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hands_Across_America
Apparently it was aimed at fighting poverty and homelessness, and was organized by the same group that produced "We Are the World". But what's wild to me is the listed celebrities participating in various cities:
Some are interesting/reasonable:
New York City had Brooke Shields, Liza Minelli, Yoko Ono, Cardinal O'Connor
Washington D.C. had Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill
Pittsburgh had Mr. Rogers
Columbus, Ohio had Michael J. Fox
Memphis had 54 Elvis impersonators
Little Rock had Governor Bill Clinton
But some are wtf. On one hand, you had major cities with apparently no one of any status:
Baltimore's complete list is Kenny Baker (R2-D2) and Emmanuel Lewis, which I assume means that they imposed a height requirement.
Cincinnati had Chewbacca
Indianapolis has no one listed at all, just the fact that it happened in the rain
On the other hand, you had Michael Jackson, easily the biggest star on the planet at that point, in Youngstown, Ohio.
Other things to note:
Anthony Daniels (C-3PO) was in Long Beach, California.
The wikipedia page lists a total of 24 cities, 5 of which are in Ohio (Youngstown, Cleveland, Toledo, Columbus, Cincinnati)
So clearly, this entire page was created by some Star Wars freak that grew up in middle Ohio.