Ellsworth County’s First Free Youth Camp took place July 31 at Shanelec Field.
The day was organized by former Ellsworth High School football standout Takota Anderson with assistance from friends Kaden Davis, Colton Hower, and Jacob Kerby.
Takota, a 2015 EHS graduate, pursued his dream of playing college football — playing two years at Dodge City Community College and two more years at Kansas Wesleyan University. He just returned from playing a season of Professional Arena Football in Amarillo, Texas for the Amarillo Venom.
EHS alum Kaden Davis, who graduated in 2017, kept his dream alive playing college football at Butler Community College for two years before transferring to Northwest Missouri State, where he continues to play wide receiver.
Colton Hower graduated in 2017 from Ellsworth and was a teammate to Kaden at Butler Community College for two years. He transferred to Emporia State University and is in his second year of playing wide receiver.
 Jacob Kerby, also a 2017 EHS graduate, played four years of football at Friends University in Wichita. Jacob has been playing semi-pro ball in Wichita as well.
Other coaches included Lance Stefek, a junior high football coach, and Zach Smith, a 2013 graduate of EHS. The rest of the coaches were all former teammates of Takota Anderson in his college career.
According to Anderson:
The point of this camp was to do something us as kids growing up never had. We didn’t have guys like us in our position to do it for us. When we were kids you would have your regular football camp a week or two before your first game or if you wanted to go to a camp and learn basic fundamentals, you have to go to Wichita or Kansas City or out of state and those camps aren’t cheap at all.
This was something I thought would be great for the kids because it was right in their back yard basically and it was free. All they had to do was show up and we look forward to making this an annual thing.
From what I know and people I have talked to we are the first couple guys to play college football all four years coming from Ellsworth High School in a lot of years and I mean a lot. So to the guys and I that is big because we want to be an inspiration to change the culture of kids with athletic dreams.  Playing any college sport at any level is a dedication and grind and if you aren’t fully committed it won’t work.
Guys go and try and don’t stick with it but if you ask me you aren’t a college football player if you don’t play all four years and we all are an example of that because we stuck with it because of how much we love the game.
This camp was a great experience for us as coaches and players because we got to give back knowledge of everything we learned over the years and teach them and you could really see that every kid that showed up Saturday morning wanted to get better and they all really listened well. It was awesome! Our message to these kids at the camp was that we just wanted to give back and we wanted to teach and show them that it is capable to follow your dreams and Don’t let anybody tell you can’t because if it’s something you want you can do it — and we all support Ellsworth Sports because that’s what molded us into who we are today.

Also the camp wouldn’t have went near as good as it went without our sponsors for it. Huge thank you to them all - Lindsay Mog with  Hi-Jinks Rec. sponsored snacks for all the kids, Lucas Barta with Copeland Insurance a graduating Ellsworth native sponsored all the water and Gatorade, and Cashco Manufacturing sponsored the T-shirts we got made for it.