Toby Keith's children 'carry the torch' for his Oklahoma foundation's cancer charity work

NORMAN — Krystal Keith is expecting Father's Day to be tough.

But she anticipates that July 4 actually will be harder for the family her father, Toby Keith, left behind.

"That's a time that we've always spent with him: We typically are at our lake house or the golf club, and that's a really big holiday for him. He used to take us all, and we literally would fill the bed of his truck with fireworks," she told The Oklahoman in a one-on-one interview.

"Usually, Father's Day, he was on the road, or I was on the road. It wasn't always something we definitely spent together. But Fourth of July was."

Three months after the country music superstar died Feb. 5 at age 62 after a multiyear battle with stomach cancer, Keith's wife, Tricia Covel, and their three children — daughters Krystal Keith and Shelley Covel Rowland and son Stelen Covel — were among the crowd of about 800 people who gathered Friday night at Riverwind Casino to kick off the 20th annual Toby Keith & Friends Golf Classic.

Her father's hometown cancer charity event returned May 31-June 1 in Norman, where it continued to serve as the largest annual fundraiser for the Toby Keith Foundation's OK Kids Korral, a cost-free home-away-from-home for children with cancer seeking treatment in Oklahoma City.

"I would say — and he had said — this is one of the greatest gifts he could give the world was the Korral. So, this is one of the things that he looked the most forward to, and I think this is the thing that my siblings and I have discussed being kind of our purpose from this point forward," said Krystal Keith, a Norman-based singer-songwriter.

"Obviously, it's hard, because this is the first one without him. … But we're excited to kick off what the future is going to hold for this foundation."

Toby Keith's children are making his Oklahoma charity 'our purpose'

Krystal Keith and her siblings kicked off the festivities at Friday night's dinner, auction and concert, which annually takes place the night before the shotgun start golf tournament at Norman's Belmar Golf Club, which their father co-owned.

"We have known and loved you guys for 20 years, and many of you have been here every single year," Krystal Keith told the capacity crowd at the gala. "We appreciate the dedication that you guys have put into this foundation and my dad's mission to provide something like the OK Kids Korral. It really does benefit so many kids."

She shared from the Riverwind stage that the OK Kids Korral helped her during the COVID-19 pandemic, when her older daughter, Hensley, now 8, was treated in the intensive care unit at Oklahoma Children's Hospital OU Health after being bitten by a brown recluse spider.

"So, I know how important it is to have that right there, so close to the hospital, personally," said Krystal Keith, who has two daughters with her husband, Drew Sandubrae.

Her father's longtime friends Bob Stoops, former University of Oklahoma head football coach, and Jim West, business executive and founder of NCAA golf’s Jim West Challenge, stepped in as emcees for this year's gala, with Gene McKown as auctioneer.

This year's live auction alone raised an estimated $1.9 million, and with the silent auction, the event is expected to raise more than $2 million for the Toby Keith Foundation.

Before this year, the Toby Keith & Friends Golf Classic had raised a total of nearly $18 million for the Oklahoma City-based foundation, with the 2023 installment having raised a record $1.8 million.

"Somebody has to carry the torch, somebody has to lead the charge in raising money and making sure that this foundation is able to continue to support the Korral. So, we've already started stepping into those roles in making sure that we are helping to build those relationships," Krystal Keith told The Oklahoman behind the scenes at Riverwind, where she sat on the same green room couch where her father often gave interviews.

"The work still has to be done. And we're here to do it."

Toby Keith posthumously reaches a new milestone with '35 Biggest Hits'

Also from the Riverwind stage Friday night, Rowland, Keith's older daughter, told the crowd that her father has posthumously achieved a new career milestone: His chart-topping 2008 compiliation album "35 Biggest Hits" has spent 150 consecutive weeks on Billboard's all-genre Top 200 chart, a first for the Songwriters Hall of Famer.

"And it's still hanging on: It'll reach 151 on Sunday. Cheers to that," Rowland said, toasting the applauding crowd with a red Solo cup.

That their father's music has been played and purchased so widely since his death is a testament to the strength of his catalog, Krystal Keith said.

"That gives him three albums that are over 100 weeks on the Billboard charts — and one of them was two full years. ... He had a ton of hits, and it's pretty incredible," she said. "I think people, looking back, realize that he was a huge part of their childhood soundtrack or their teenage years soundtrack or whatever."

Toby Keith's daughter looks forward to his fall Country Music Hall of Fame induction

Just as they always did for Fourth of July celebrations with her father, Krystal Keith said her family has come together in the wake of his death.

"We're a very close-knit family," she said. "We all live within a couple miles of each other. So, we've all just kept each other busy, kept my mom busy."

She and her siblings have twice traveled to Texas this year to attend star-studded broadcast tributes to their late father: Brooks & Dunn, Sammy Hagar and Lainey Wilson performed in his memory at the CMT Music Awards in April in Austin, while Jason Aldean played a special salute in May at the Academy of Country Music Awards in Frisco.

"It's very sweet that everyone is doing tributes. I think it shows what an impact he has, and on not just artists (with) the tributes from the sports world and everything. He had such an impact in so many industries: The horse racing industry ... they're doing things in honor of him, as well. Just everywhere he went, he made an impact," said Krystal Keith, who sang the national anthem Wednesday night ahead of Game 1 of OU vs. Texas softball in the Women's College World Series Championship Series in Oklahoma City.

"It's hard to go to events in honor of him and that are honoring him, but we've done it because it's part of our duty as his family. So, that has kept us busy and engaged."

A well-known Sooners superfan, the "Should've Been a Cowboy" hitmaker, who grew up in Moore, particularly made his mark at OU, where the Norman resident saw all three of his children graduate.

"He told me the same thing he told my sisters: He would send me to college anywhere I wanted in the world as long as it was in Norman," Stelen Covel told The Oklahoman backstage at Friday night's gala.

In May, Krystal Keith said she was honored to accept the honorary degree their alma mater posthumously bestowed on their father, although "obviously, it was bittersweet. I wish it was him."

"He was super excited to get that doctorate. We joked in our kitchen about it. I was like, 'Man, I spent four and a half years there, taking classes, earning hours. And you get a phone call, and they're giving you a doctorate.' ... But I know he earned it," recalled the 2009 OU alumnus with a grin.

"Because he couldn't go to college, he made it his mission to absorb knowledge and learn. I would argue he had a doctorate in horse racing: You could ask him about any horse he had, and he knew the pedigree, the pedigree of the parents. ... He knew everything about it — and he was just that way about everything that he enjoyed. That was how he took on life."

Krystal Keith said she is particularly excited to see her father enshrined into the Country Music Hall of Fame this fall in Nashville, Tennessee.

"We've always had a great relationship with the Hall of Fame. He's had exhibits and things there in the past, and I wish that he had been around to get that," she said.

"But it's exciting that he's going to be there and will be in legendary status forever."

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Toby Keith's kids continuing mission to help Oklahomans with cancer