'Sad papaw' makes hundreds of new friends in Oklahoma

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Monday, March 28, 2016
Hundreds show up to honor lonely Papaw
Sad Papaw gets tons of support at weekend cookout

PURCELL, OK -- The power of social media has turned an Oklahoma granddad into an Internet celebrity.

And it's thanks to five grandkids who couldn't be bothered to show up for dinner.

Kenny "Papaw" Harmon won't be eating burgers alone anytime soon.

The Internet sensation and Oklahoma native hosted a cookout Saturday for the public to come eat with him.

Papaw is so popular, hundreds showed up just to get a picture with him.

"It's hard to get used to it," Harmon says. "I haven't been able to wrap my head around this thing yet."

Harmon's new-found fame is thanks to this one tweet that went viral around the world.

When his granddaughter tweeted that his other grandkids were "no shows" for a dinner he cooked for them. Support quickly flooded in.

"I guess she touched on the right theme," Harmon says.

Papaw says he believes people came to remember their own grandparents.

"The theme that comes to me from almost everybody is their grandparents, their great-grandparents, what they want to do now or what they wish they had done before," he said.

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