Toby Keith golf tournament raises $250,000 for cancer patients' families

Tuesday, May 25th 2004, 5:33 am

By: News On 6

NORMAN, Okla. (AP) -- A celebrity golf tournament hosted by Toby Keith raised about $250,000 to assist families of pediatric cancer patients in Oklahoma, the country superstar said Monday.

Keith organized the golf classic following the August death of Allison Webb, the 2-year-old daughter of one of his original bandmates, Scott Webb. Allison spent the last year of her life being treated for Wilms tumors affecting both of her kidneys.

The funds from the tournament and an auction including items donated by sports teams and entertainers including Garth Brooks and Christina Aguilera will benefit a charity named in her honor, the Ally's House Foundation, Keith said.

The foundation helps defray the cost of treatment, short-term housing near hospitals, groceries, hospice and funeral expenses.

"When you bring your child to get treatment, you're away from your home a lot, you're distraught and you just have the burden of the world put upon your shoulders," Keith said. "Seeing an innocent child being stricken down with such a horrible disease with her whole future in front of her, we wanted to make sure that ... she didn't die completely in vain.

"We're such a small group of fighters fighting this horrible disease. Maybe, through the years, we can make it a little easier on somebody else."

Down the road, Keith hopes Ally's House will include an actual house where families can stay during treatment.