GREENE COUNTY, Tenn. — This year's running of the Rose Parade will have a special East Tennessee connection by honoring an East Tennessee man.
"He was a typical live wire,” said Peggy Sams, Dakota Sams’ mother. "You would never know anything was wrong with him. Then we noticed his abdomen was getting bigger and bigger."
Dakota Sams was diagnosed with an extremely rare genetic liver condition as a toddler. It is often fatal by age five. But a liver transplant days before his fourth birthday saved his life. His parents said he flourished from that point on.
His parents, Tommy and Peggy Sams, described their son’s love for welding.
"He started as a freshman and by the time he was a senior, they didn’t have a class for him. He just helped the instructor. He also helped the instructor teach at night," they said.
Dakota Sams also became very outspoken about organ donation.
“One time he was at the driver’s license office, and he heard them ask a guy if he wanted to be an organ donor and the guy said no. Dakota got out of line and went up there and said if it was not for an organ donor I wouldn’t be here. The guy ended up leaving an organ donor," they said.
In May 2020, Dakota Sams tragically lost his life in a motorcycle crash on a rural Greene County roadway. He was just 21 years old. He was an organ donor.
“132 people’s lives were either saved or made better through tissue, tendons, his eyes,” said Tommy Sams. "Two people are now seeing that were totally blind — now they are able to see.”
Now, his message will be on display for the world to see. His story will be one of 35 honored on this year's Donate Life float in the Rose Parade.
His parents recently traveled to Nashville to place the finishing touches on the flora-graph of his picture.
“We used coffee grounds and filled in the eyebrows, she did one and I did the other," Tommy Sams said.
“He would be so honored. It’s what he wanted, it’s exactly what he wanted, and it makes what’s so bitter a little bit easier to accept.,” said Peggy Sams.
The Sams now work to keep their son's memory alive by telling Dakota’s daughter stories about her father. They've also established a welding scholarship at Tennessee College of Applied Technology in Morristown and have donated more than $26,000 to welding students in their son's name.
“We give each new welding student a t-shirt, and we just started giving helmets to each new welding student," they said.
Their hope is his story will lead others to become organ donors.
"We know what difference an organ donor made in our life, and he would tell everybody you don’t need your organs in heaven," they said.
If you would like to find out more about organ donation, click here to learn more about Donate Life.
The Rose Parade airs News Year’s Day on News 5 WCYB.