How Natural Light beer helped a N.J. native's camp for children affected by cancer

Ryan Campbell, far right, parties with his friends at North Carolina before a Tar Heels sporting event. Natural Light awarded him a $40,000 scholarship to help him pay off his student loans and continue his work with children with cancer. (Photo courtesy of Ryan Campbell)

Remember drinking Natty Light in college? Maybe not, either because you drank enough of it to forget or you've blacked out your memories of blacking out with the watered down booze.

But Natural Light has given one New Jersey native a gift he will never forget.

Ryan Campbell, a Blairstown native and North Warren Regional High School graduate, won a $40,000 scholarship from the beer company that will help him pay off his student loans and go to graduate school. The scholarship, he says, will eventually help him run "Happiness is Camping," a summer camp in Hardwick for kids ages 6 to 15 who have cancer or siblings that are dealing with the disease.

Natural Light may be among the cheapest beers at the liquor store it's giving away an expensive gift -- $1 million in total, with 25 winners earning scholarships in the coming months.

"I did drink a lot of Natty Light," Ryan Campbell said. "And I never thought it would help me out in school, that's for sure."

Campbell has been involved with the camp for his entire life. His grandfather was the original camp director before his dad took over. When his father moved into the executive director role, Campbell became the camp director.

"All of our kids spent basically their entire lives in a hospital or they're taken out of school so they don't really have that sense of belonging everywhere because they've always been on the outside," Campbell said. "This is really the first place that they've been to where everybody has been through the same experience so now everybody belongs here."

Campbell graduated from the University of North Carolina in 2014 and worked at Disney for two years before coming to work at the camp full time. He was scrolling through Twitter one day in January when he saw that Natural Light was offering scholarships to help people pay down student loans.

It took Campbell about five minutes before he knew what he wanted to do for his submission, scaling the camp's climbing tower and explaining his role at the camp and how his education made it possible.

With his undergraduate student loans all but paid off, Campbell will now be able to go to graduate school and get a business degree, which will help him become the camp's executive director one day.

Campbell's calling is honorable and charitable. But that doesn't mean he didn't party hard during his time in Chapel Hill. He and his friends did more than just get drunk before basketball and football games -- they pounded Natty Light and dressed up in foot suits. Yes, foot costumes, to look like the North Carolina Tar Heel logo.

That may have been a regrettable decision, though Campbell cherishes the memory. Now, he's giving new meaning to the term "beer money."

"It's definitely helped, getting dressed up as a foot. But I never would have thought that it would help me out the way it did, and I'm so thankful for it."

Jeremy Schneider may be reached at jschneider@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @J_Schneider. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

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