Steve Hogan, Nebraska's first African-American professional golfer, died Saturday at the age of 55. His impact went beyond the course to the heart of the community.

The head pro at Miller Park Golf Course in Omaha started the Hogan's Junior Golf Heroes program in 1990 to teach the game to inner-city youth. It soon became part of the worldwide First Tee program.

Hogan was honored nationally many times for his work with young people, including the Martin Luther King Jr. Living The Dream Award in 2001.

Hogan instilled in his young golfers that it's never too late to achieve your dream, to never give up on yourself, to never quit working and always play by the rules. He lived his life primarily to set an example of how to beat the odds and give back at the same time.

Steve Hogan Jr. is just like his father, sharing with others everything he knows about golf. "I want to be like him. There couldn't have been a better role model for me."

Jim Beatty and his friend Burrell Williams also picked up the basics of the sport from Hogan Sr. Beatty's teacher, friend and mentor died after a battle with colon cancer. Hogan is survived by his wife and three children.

"I was very sad,” said Beatty. “I missed him immediately. I cried. I cried last night and I'll probably cry some more, but then I turn to remembering all of the great things that Steve stood for."

The golf guru made history in 1989, becoming the first Professional Golfers Association African-American from Nebraska.

"He saw it as an opportunity that there were not in Nebraska, for certain, any blacks involved in golf from a PGA standpoint and also very few on the national standpoint," said Beatty.

What was just as important to Hogan as his personal accomplishment was finding a way to make sure he wasn't the last one to make history in the game of golf to come out of Omaha.

In 1990 he formed Hogan's Junior Golf Heroes, a six-week summer program that introduces golf to neighborhood children. Every year, more than 600 children came to Miller Park to do their part on the course and off in the repair shop.

“He was always the one that would sit them down, take the time and say let's give them a chance, whether it would be just have them helping out mowing the grass or picking up balls, he always gave everybody a chance," said Hogan Jr.

A chance that he plans to make sure remains a part of his father's legacy as much as it was a part of his life. "For all the years that he's invested in this and to see what it's become. He was a rising star."

To remain enrolled continuously in the Hogan's Junior Golf Heroes program, children must maintain good grades in school. Click here for more information about Hogan's Junior Golf Heroes.