Such a great story

Many of you will remember an e-mail I sent a few months ago about an Omaha man, John Atkinson, who was entering a contest to play at the US Open. (It was a "Vote for this Omahan" type of e-mail.) I, and many of you I'm sure, saw the story on WOWT here in Omaha. It was actually the second piece on that station I had seen about John . (He had recently been diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer and the fact that he caught the disease as a non-smoker forced him to contact the local news to raise awareness of lung cancer.)

Anyway, guess what. John won the contest and played at Torrey Pines - home of the US Open! Not only did he play this championship course, his foursome consisted of himself, Justin Timberlake, Tony Romo and Matt Lauer. How rad is that!!?? Two weeks ago I actually caught the very, very tail end of his story on the NBC Nightly News. His story has also been on NBC Sports and he was featured on the Today Show this morning. Be sure to check it out.

I think it's a very cool case study on local media helping out a community member. It's also a testament to the city of Omaha, because - while I don't know for sure - I bet many, many people saw his story on TV and voted online. (The winner ultimately was chosen by who received the most votes). It's also great to see an uplifting, hopeful, feel good story after the recent Little Sioux Boy Scout camp tragedy, monumental and devastating flooding in Iowa and the sudden passing of Tim Russert.

Congratulations, John. And riddle me this: are Tony and Jessica REALLY headed toward Splittsville???