These links are your links

These Links are Your Links

In its origins, more than 600 years ago, golf had an egalitarian spirit. Although it was enjoyed primarily by an elitist clientele for its first few years in this country, the game, as pioneered by municipalities, quickly found its public roots again. From that foundation, the public game became the bedrock upon which golf in the United States has sprouted. Now more than ever the game has become “one for all.” Of the roughly 15,000 courses in

the U.S., nearly 75 percent are open to the public and, according to National Golf Foundation statistics, better than four out of every five golfers are public-course players. Individuals in all aspects of the game, like those profiled on these pages, have been shaped by public golf. Many have become standard-bearers for the game, carrying the message that

has been documented by numerous industry studies over the past 50 years: Public golf touches us all.

Compiled by Tom Williams & Rich Skyzinski
graphic Illustrations by John Grimwade

(Look who came from public golf ...)

Tag-along Pro She learned the game the hard way, tagging along at the nine-hole municipal course in Roswell, N.M., and pleading to her father to be given a club and a

ball so she could play as well. Nancy Lopez’s father acceded to her wishes in a way that almost guaranteed she’d quickly lose interest in the game; he gave her a 4-wood to hit.

“Surely it wasn’t one that was in the best shape,” she remembers of Cahoon Park. “It had lots of hardpan, lots of wind.”

Lopez never had a formal lesson when she was learning the game. She received the basics of the swing from her father, Domingo, who worked in an auto body repair shop and many times could only afford to buy one bucket of balls when she wanted to practice.

City Instructor When he was a youngster, he caddied at a number of clubs in Dallas. He shagged balls for Tony Lema. But Leonard Jones couldn’t play. African-Americans were not permitted to play those courses, so Leonard and his brother, Marlin, and their friends created their own.

“We made our course go through the park and the projects,” he remembers.

Eventually, Jones found places to play - public places. Now he’s a fixture in Dallas golf. He has been teaching at city-owned courses for 20 years, the last 13 at L.B. Houston Golf Course.

“The thing that still fascinates me today is looking at different swings,” he says. “I can remember thinking as a caddie, ‘How can a guy hit the ball that well with that bad swing?’ “

It’s hard to know how far Jones’s swing might have taken him. He won a pair of minority tournaments (the 1968 state amateur and ‘64 junior) - on public courses, of course.

A Simple Plan The president of the American Society of Golf Course Architects grew up in Los Angeles, playing mostly at one of the par-3 courses south of the city, or at a county-owned facility, either Los Amigos or La Mirada.

Damian Pascuzzo recalls the courses as being “simple,” a characteristic that still affects his design philosophy. “I’m learning some of the things that you don’t have to do,” he says. “For some people, playing is an escape from the office, a way to spend four or five hours with friends and enjoy the game; they could care less how deep your bunkers are. It doesn’t matter to them how strategic holes are, or that your greens Stimp out at 10 or 101/2. They don’t need all the bells and whistles; they don’t want all the bells and whistles.”

The ASGCA’s upcoming book, Practical Golf, espouses the need for affordable facilities and gives advice on how to build them.

“That’s where the future of the game is,” says Pascuzzo.

Teaching Every Body The Oak Marr Golf Complex in Fairfax County, Va., is a comprehensive facility: 70 hitting stations, a 25,000-square-foot practice putting green and a nine-hole par-3 course. Not exactly what teaching professional Noel Jablonski had when she was learning to play.

She learned golf at Cleveland’s Seneca Golf Course, a city course. “They had a range for people who wanted to practice,” she says, “but you had to bring your own balls and you had to shag them yourself.”

Now Jablonski enlists golfers - of all kinds. She oversees Oak Marr’s aptly-named Every Body Golf School and helps with the Combo Classic, a county event that pairs a player with disabilities with a physically able golfer. “Every kind of disability imaginable is represented,” she says. “They ask me, Can you help me figure out how to hit the ball? É That’s what we do.”

The Long View He can vouch that many aspects of public golf have improved - but not everything.

“The art of fixing ball marks,” Ken Lapp says, “that is disappearing. It used to be you’d walk onto a green and fix two or three marks. Players now don’t fix their own.”

Lapp is superintendent at Cog Hill Golf & Country Club in Lemont, Ill., where he has worked since 1973. He used to allocate a person from his staff to each of Cog Hill’s four courses, just to repair ball marks. “I had to eventually pull them,” says Lapp, “because players figured, they’re going to fix them.”

It didn’t help, so the ball mark repair crew is back this season. Keeping the course in top shape is key because Cog Hill hosts the PGA Tour’s Western Open. That’s another problem: Lapp’s regular players see tour conditions and want them all the time.

“The expectations of the public player have increased because of television,” he says, “But the average player doesn’t understand why you can’t care for a course like that on a regular basis.”

Community Servant He has come a long way since 1958, when he was hired at city-owned Haggin Oaks Golf Course in Sacramento, Calif., to be a starter and repair clubs, but he’s never left the public sector. Ken Morton Sr. became a partner in the management of the city’s courses and later assumed sole control of the lease operations of 81 holes spread over three facilities.

That work, though, pales in comparison to Morton’s efforts with Say Golf, a 19-year-old non-profit enterprise that has become a model for other community programs.

“It started out as a way to help the high school golf teams,” he says.

That accomplished, the program then set a goal of finding a way to entice more kids to play before high school. Say Golf’s competitive junior program involves 400 kids and 27 area courses, a Special Olympics program and a four-year-old initiative which introduces the game to upward of 700 inner-city children.

“At first we tried to get kids involved in the game,” added Morton, Say Golf’s CEO. “Now we’re trying to give them something bigger than the game. We’re trying to teach them core values and life skills through golf.”

Public Pioneer One of the most celebrated figures in U.S. golf history grew up in a modest house in Brookline, Mass., across the street from The Country Club’s 17th green. At the time of Francis Ouimet’s monumental upset to win the 1913 U.S. Open, golf in the U.S. lacked a sense of direction.

There were few players and perhaps a score of public courses, but Ouimet’s Page 1 triumph sparked a boom that changed the course of the game in the U.S. forever. Within a decade, it is estimated, the number of players had tripled - the USGA even initiated a championship exclusively for public-course players - and courses began to spring up in every major city.

Ouimet was self-taught. He learned to play in his backyard, as a caddie at The Country Club and among the informal courses laid out in public parks and empty lots.