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SHAWN DIXON -
GETTING A PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE
TO COLUMBUS, KENTUCKY,
HIS HOMETOWN
WAS A DREAM COME TRUE
| Shawn Dixon listens to John Edwards speak |
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Twenty four year old Shawn Dixon, Hickman County High and University of Kentucky graduate, began an impossible
task this summer: get enough people to sign onto a website (eventful.com) to overwhelm every other city, town and hamlet in
the United States to win a visit from former US Senator John Edwards.
Dixon, now a first semester scholarship
student in the NYU School of Law, contacted everyone he knew, then he put his plea on his Facebook site. Newspapers throughout
the US began to pick up on the campaign as little Columbus, Kentucky (pop. 229) pulled ahead of Los Angeles, Seattle and all
other competitors.
When the deadline passed, Columbus was a bit shy of 1900 votes. It was enough. Columbus would
host its first presidential candidate, according to local lore, since William Jennings Bryan.
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| Co. Judge Greg Pruittl (holding microphone) and |
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| Mayor Frizzell (who gave away the key to the city) |
Thanks to Eventful.com, there was West Kentucky Barbecue, pecan pie, chips and drinks available - and
the crowd lined up to eat before Edwards arrived. 
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Edwards spent over an hour speaking and answering questions. He took questions on health care, the war
in Iraq, getting jobs into rural areas and what his first accomplishment would be (universal health care and ending the war
in Iraq).
He signed autographs, shook hands with those who crowded around and then he had a press conference on
the bluff overlooking the mighty Mississippi River.
| Shawn Dixon watches as Edwards takes questions |
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It was a day for Hickman
County to throw out the welcome mat to not only John Edwards, but the many visitors who had never been to Columbus Belmont
Park. People came from all over the region - Tennessee, Missouri, Illinois, and all over Kentucky.
The Park was
pronounced "one of the most beautiful". (Of course, we all knew that!)
The Hickman County High
School Band performed and did a great job. Volunteers and Park employees ran golf cart shuttles up and down the hill
to the event. The Park was back to normal by late afternoon.
Whatever one's political leanings - center,
right, left, or not at all - the event proved that rural America has a voice and its young people, like Shawn Dixon,
are willing to speak for it wherever they may go.
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