Chronicles of Appreciation: Golf writing

Golf has been a life-long love affair and, like most love affairs, embodies every human emotion known to man.

Because I feel so disproportionately drawn to the game, and because of the cosmic glitch that once allowed me to shoot 69 in qualifying for a tournament (hooking me forever to Shivas Irons and Bobby Jones), I have been asked on several occasions to author programs for important golf tournaments, write about golf equipment or (once) the history of a clubhouse.

For the U.S. Women’s Amateur at the Biltmore Forest Club in Asheville, I developed a hole-by-hole player’s notebook, informed by the strategic sketches of Curtis Cup player Brenda Corrie Kuehn. I also researched and wrote summary pieces on the history of tournament play at the club, touching in on the lives of Louise Suggs, Estelle Page, P.J. Boatwright, Ben Hogan, Ralph Gudahl, and Byron Nelson.

For the 2003 USGA Senior Amateur at the Virginian, I took a similar player’s approach to describing each hole, with the program itself focused primarily on the draws of the surrounding southwest Virginia region, in general.

Over the years, too, I’ve written about the golf architecture of Donald Ross, Pete Dye, Arthur Hills and Jack Nicklaus. The writing’s been great; nevertheless, I’ve still only broken 70 once.