Bobby Nichols Foundation donates $116k to Blessings in a Backpack

FORT MYERS, Fla. - April 10, 2017 - PRLog -- The Bobby Nichols Charity Foundation recently presented $116,000 to Blessings in a Backpack of Southwest Florida to support its mission of making hunger-free weekends a reality for food-insecure children in Lee and Collier counties. Proceeds from the 15^th annual Nichols Cup Celebrity Pro-Am Golf Tournament were earmarked for several not-for-profit organizations who serve vulnerable children.

In Lee and Collier counties, 60,000 elementary students who receive free breakfast and lunch would struggle to get the nutrition they need over the weekend without Blessings in a Backpack of Southwest Florida. The organization sends enough breakfast, lunch and snack foods home with more than 3,000 students on Friday afternoons to get them through to a productive, happy Monday morning.

The Bobby Nichols Charity Foundation, founded in 2002, is a group of Fiddlesticks members known as Pipers who volunteer to organize and run the golf tournament plus a charity tennis tournament. Blessings in a Backpack was added to the foundation's beneficiaries in 2011, and has received more than $540,000 from the group over the last six years. Bobby Nichols, winner of 14 PGA Tour tournaments including the 1964 PGA Championship and 1974 Canadian Open, has been a resident of Fiddlesticks since its inception.

Blessings in a Backpack of Southwest Florida Executive Director Cecilia St. Arnold said, "The Bobby Nichols Charity Foundation really is a blessing to our organization and an inspiring example of how individuals working together can make a monumental impact. It only takes $100 to feed one child four meals every weekend for 38 weeks, and the Fiddlesticks community will help us grow and serve even more children."