My First Golf Adventure

1961

During the summer of 1961, after grade 8, I had nothing planned. I wasn't going to let a lack of strategy hold me back.

I wasn't a golfer yet. That would happen in the future. There was a nice private golf course on the outskirts of the neighborhood where I lived. A few of my boys decided to try our luck at caddying.  There was no barrier like a job application. The deal was to simply show up and wait in the caddy pen. It was on the job learning as I recall. The only teaching was from someone more experienced waiting in the pen with you.

The caddy pen was bona fide pen. Pigs would have flown to get a spot. Hidden between the clubhouse and the first tee, chicken wire walls held up a corrugated tin roof which covered a dirt floor. The only amenity was bench seats painted with fast peeling green paint. The members of the club must have been embarrassed by it.

There wasn't a caddy manager. If a golfer wanted a caddy they simply wandered over the pen to see who was available. It was like a scene out of the slave movie Spartacus which was a recent award winner.

I didn't go every day.  And I didn't go at 7 a.m. when the keenest golfers teed off. I was most likely to show up about 10 a couple of days a week. My logic was that golfers played all day long and I'd only want to do one loop. That's the technical term for carrying a bag for one 18 hole round of golf. Ten a.m. was plenty early. We earned something like two bucks per loop including tip.

Early in July when I was still a newbie, I was in the pen with my buddy Irv waiting to get picked. We were the only caddies in the pen just then. Slim pickings for the golfers. Lots of opportunity for us.

Suddenly a big white and blue Oldsmobile convertible pulls up to the pen. A nice looking man wearing a fedora, sporting a Clark Gable thin mustache and smoking a cigar leans over and yells at us “can you guys pack doubles at Aurora this afternoon”.

We barely understood what he meant but notwithstanding that we jumped in the car and were on our way.

Packing doubles in Aurora meant we were both going to carry two golf bags for a loop at the Aurora Golf and Country Club a private course about 40 kilometers north.

The afternoon wasn't a total success. First of all it was very hot and carrying two bags made it a struggle. Secondly we didn't know what we were doing. We were not great at following the flight of balls. We often were in the wrong place and getting in way. Needless to say we were no help with club selection or reading greens.

The man who picked us up used his 8 iron for most of his shots. It was the one club he had confidence in. Now that I'm an experienced golfer I understand what a good lesson that was. One’s feelings for the club in his hands can be as important as any other part of the swing.

Eight iron man was Wally Crouter who at the time was the morning host on a major local radio station. He kept that esteemed position for 34 more years ending on exactly his 50th anniversary at the station in 1996.

The round ended at about 5 o'clock.  We were exhausted.  Mr. Crouter handed us $15 each and left us to get home on our own. We walked out to Yonge St and took a cab back to our hood for $4 each. When we arrived at our strip mall hang out with $11 in our pockets we were the richest kids on the block and I'm sure we treated everyone to a coke at least.

As that day started my world view was pretty limited. But 10 hours later I had travelled a great distance, met a celebrity, drove in a convertible, packed doubles, learned an important golf lesson and took a cab all for possibly the first time in my life. Two more days like that and I would have been ready for anything.