Optimist Club Fishing Rodeo This Saturday at CJ Park

File photo – The East Ridge Optimist Club is holding its Fishing Rodeo at Camp Jordan Park on Saturday morning.

The unofficial kick-off to summer will take place this coming Saturday, June 1, as the East Ridge Optimist Club hosts its 7th Annual Kids’ Fishing Rodeo at Dickert Pond inside Camp Jordan Park.

Registration for the free event begins at 8:30 a.m., with fishing in the stocked pond from 9 a.m. to high noon.

The event is open to children under 15-years of age, officials said. Exceptions may be made for special needs children, organizers said.

Awards will be presented in a number of categories including smallest fish, largest fish and overall champion.

Hotdogs and cold drinks will be available on site.

About Dick Cook

Dick Cook has lived in East Ridge since the Kennedy Administration when his parents bought a house on Marietta Street. Dick graduated from ERHS in 1976 before going on to the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga where he studied Political Science. Dick worked for the Chattanooga Free-Press and the Chattanooga Times Free Press for 22 years. Free-Press Sports Editor Roy Exum plucked him out of production in 1989 and gave him a job as a sports reporter. Dick covered everything from prep sports to the whitewater events on the Ocoee River for the 1996 Olympics. When Chattanooga's two paper's merged, he became the Crime Reporter covering both the Chattanooga Police and Fire Departments. He was among reporters who were honored by the Associated Press for the TFP's coverage of the 2002 fog-shrouded crash on I-75 in Catoosa County, Dick and his wife, Cathy, live on Marlboro Avenue where they are seen frequently chasing around their three grandsons.