Thanks to the skill of the professional golfers, and generosity of contributors, local charities will have a lot of new money to spend in the coming year. Today officials of the John Deere Classic tournament announced results from this year's Birdies for Charity program - 6.3 million dollars.
Each year people pledge to local charities based on the number of birdies recorded by players in the annual PGA tournament, then additional money is added by the John Deere Foundation.
For the third year in a row, the tournament helped raise more than 6 million dollars, and it'll be divided by 471 local and regional charities.
More than 20,000 businesses and individuals participated.
Since the professional golf tournament was first held in the Quad Cities in 1971, it's helped raise nearly 62.5 million dollars for charity.