Dave Osborn Looking to Bowl Over the Competition at Mr. Fountain Valley

Since 1996, owner Dave Osborn has been turning his own personal tragedy into a positive for local students, creating the Kelly Osborn Memorial Scholarship Fund in memory of his daughter, who was killed in a car accident when she was just 19. Osborn will take that ultimate motivation to the stage Friday night at the Mr. Fountain Valley pageant as he tries to raise money for the fund and take home the crown. Osborn spoke with Fountain Valley Patch about his charity and about his plans for the pageant.

What made you decide to compete in the pageant?

[Pageant Director] Jeanne Thomas asked me if I would be interested, and talked a little bit about the fact that I could help out my charity, and that was kind of the thing that enticed me was that I could raise money for my memorial fund. I never really thought about the contest in the beginning; it was really just a way to raise some money for my memorial fund.

Tell us more about your charity.

The charity is named after my youngest daughter, Kelly. She was killed in an automobile accident in 1996, and she was only 19 years old. After her death, I just about went nuts, and I was trying to figure out something I could do positive in her name, so I started this scholarship fund so we could help local kids with their higher education. We started out small, but it's grown, and we've given out more than $150,000 in scholarships. For me, that was kind of the thing that kept me sane.

What's your strategy going into the pageant?

Really it's going to be more of a fun thing. I think everybody would like to win, but I've got a couple of surprises that I'm going to bring out that nobody knows about, so hopefully that might have some impact. But I think it's going to be entertaining, and I think all of the guys are going to have something to try to prove out there to get the audience involved.

How would you feel if you won the title?

I haven't really thought about that. I'm just trying to concentrate on doing the best I can in the event and having as much fun as possible, and just try to entertain the crowd.

Any final thoughts?

Everybody's taking this very seriously, but in a light kind of way, so I think you're going to see a very interesting group of guys participating. Jeanne Thomas has really spearheaded this event, and she's doing a great job trying to get us all into shape for this event.