Staff and students from 62 schools in the Illinois Valley wrote to Merry Noonan and her six-member committee that work on Lou’s LaGrotto’s “Concerts For a Cause.” While all those schools needed help, one stood out.”I wrote an elaborate three-page letter on behalf of our school,” Peru Catholic School Principal Steve Brockman said. “Unfortunately, mine wasn’t picked,” he said with a laugh.
“Fortunately, a letter from one of our kindergartners, Billy Samek, was chosen. I couldn’t have been more surprised and I couldn’t have been more pleased.”
Billy wrote a letter about the lack of a playground at his school.
“I like art and PE classes. I really like recess but all we do is walk around and kick a ball around on the blacktop,” he wrote. “We usually end up moving because we get in the way of the big kids. If we had a playground, we could share it with the big kids.”
That letter touched the hearts of all the committee members.
“Each person went behind closed doors with the letters and each one came out with that letter as the winner,” said Noonan. “It was unanimous.”
Then Noonan was able to book Willie Nelson for a July 21 concert that would help the school build its playground. But when he canceled because of exhaustion, Noonan sent the county music legend an e-mail explaining what the concert was for and how important it was for the kids and their playground. After reading it, Nelson decided to play.
“We were told (Nelson’s) staff just wanted to protect him,” Brockman said. “They suggested Nelson cancel and send a donation to the school but he said no, he wanted to play the concert for the kids.”
But he didn’t just play at the concert. The legend met with Billy and his mom, Tammy, just before walking on stage.
“It was pretty exciting,” Tammy said. “Willie hugged Billy and said ‘Nice letter, kid.’ Then he posed for a photo before taking the stage.”
When the staff and students learned Willie was playing, colored ink and pencils flew as all the children designed posters with the same message.
“Thank you, Willie!”
Everyone expressed gratitude and appreciation throughout the evening about Nelson and his band helping build a playground for the kids — so much so that the Peru Catholic School, along with Noonan made sure Nelson knew how important he and his concert was to the students.
“We gave him one of our white school concert volunteer shirts with a drawing of a playground and Willie playing on it,” Tammy said. “I told him that all of the kids were just so grateful for what he was doing that they all made posters and wrote letters thanking him. He told me he already knew. Merry had given him a couple of bags of letters and posters.
“‘I plan to read them all,’ he told me.”