Longley Wins Christmas Lights Contest

Donnie Longley and his granddaughter, Khloe, receive a $100 bill as winners of East Ridge News Online’s Christmas Lights Contest.

Donnie Longley has been decorating the outside of his home on Marion Avenue for the past several years to put his family in the Christmas spirit, in particular his granddaughter Khloe.

This year his labor of love during Christmastime paid off, as Longley was selected in a poll of East Ridge News Online readers as the first winner of the Christmas Lights Contest. In winning, Longley claimed a crisp $100 bill from the city’s online news source.

“I’ve been doing this for the last few years, mostly for Khloe,” said Longley, who is an employee of Red Bank Cemetery. When this reporter pointed decorations that are likenesses of Minnie and Mickey Mouse on the pediment of his home, Longley said, “that’s Khloe’s pride and joy.”

Longley said he would be decorating next year and would enter the online contest to defend his title.

Merry Christmas Donnie, Khloe and the rest of the Longleys.

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.