Earlier this year, as excitement spread at the news that the town of Troy planned to purchase and reopen the golf course at the former Montgomery County Country Club, the news had special meaning to the family of James and Betty Hamilton of Star.
“Our family has probably hit more golf balls than anyone in Montgomery County,” says James, a retired Methodist minister and the father of four adult children for whom golf has played an important role in their lives.
James, now 80, grew up on a tobacco farm toward Pekin. “There wasn’t any golf course here then,” he recalls. But when he was a teenager, Dick Howell convinced him he should take up the sport where they could play at Badin, the closest course to Troy at the time.
“He put a club in my hand and told me how to hold it and swing,” says James. “He told me the ball would go straight down the middle, but you know what happened? The club ended up in an oak tree and I never did see the ball.”
He has fond memories of the men who helped start the golf club, ticking off names like Paul Russell, C.V. Richardson, Chalker Wallace, Jesse Wade Hurley and Leo Luquire, and days of “dubbing it once or twice a week” at the nine hole course once it was built.
Following his calling, Hamilton moved in the late 60s to Raleigh, about the time the second nine was being constructed. “Folks were helping to get it cleared up and I gave Larry Russell $600 to pay someone to pick up my share of rocks,” he recalls. “I didn’t want to run off and leave them in the lurch.”
Over the years since then, when the Hamiltons were based at churches in Montgomery County, James spent time at the local course playing golf. “Reid Harris had the Chevrolet place then; he was the only one here with a golf cart and I used to ride with him,” he says. “Doc White was the only left hander I recall playing with, and of course there’s that other minister, Buck Frye. We’ve played together 34 years.”
James got his children started in golf early in life. They were living in Fayetteville when eldest son, Bill, was little. “I got him a little golf stick when he was about 6 years old and let him hit golf balls in the front yard,” he recalls.
“I was about 8 or 9 when we moved back to the county and pretty much spent my summers at the golf course,” says Bill. “During school, Dad would pick me up after school and I’d go play nine holes.”
Bill was good enough to play with the adults and fondly recalls many of those he spent time with, Shady Leach, Fetzer Mabe, Donald Brewer and others. “One year, when I was about 10, Dick Howell was the low qualifier for the annual Hi-Lo Tournament,” he recalls. “I qualified and they paired us together. You’d have thought it was Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson paired up. I’d sandbagged so I could be with Dick and it was funny to see the reaction. All those men got me off on a good footing.”
Bill went on to make a life in golf, playing at N.C. State and making the All ACC team before graduating in 1978. During his college years, he and his next youngest brother Don who followed him at State, worked and lived in a small room at Par Golf, a par three golf center in Raleigh. “We couldn’t have afforded college otherwise,” James says.
Since then, Bill has worked as a pro, general manager and director of golf at numerous courses in Salisbury, Raleigh, Winston-Salem, the Outer Banks and Williamsburg, Va. He’s been in Delaware since 1999 and is currently general manager and director of golf at the Bayside Resort Golf Course in Fenwick Island.
“Golf has given me the opportunity to experience a lot of things I probably wouldn’t have been able to otherwise,” he says. “I’ve met and talked with Arnold Palmer, Sam Snead and Jack Nicklaus, and it’s opened up a lot of doors and been good for me and my family. The whole family is excited about seeing Troy opened back up.”
Don, who’s in the asphalt business in Lynchburg, Va., was about high school age when the family once again returned to the county. “I started hanging out at the golf course that summer and worked there through high school, hustling carts and bags, working in the pro shop and playing with my peers, Tommy Kornegay, John Harrison and Dell Mabe,” he recalls, as well as playing with some of the “older guys,” Bryan Dozier, Jeff Smith, Phil Bland, Larry Lassiter and Joe Koch.
“The pro then was Fred King and he had high school kids doing the work on the course,” he says. Sunday mornings meant getting up early and donning coveralls over his Sunday clothes to work at the course before church.
“It was a way to stay out of trouble, and working there at a young age I learned to deal with older people and learned a lot of responsibility. It helped me mature and learn to get along with the public,” he says. “I’ve got some fond memories of the place.”
Next in the Hamilton golfing line is daughter Sally, who taught PE for 14 years and now teaches fifth grade in Level Cross.
“Daddy had me out hitting balls when I was about 5 in Raleigh and I was 10 when we moved to Troy, not old enough to have anyone to play with except Daddy and Don,” she recalls. Later, she filled in on the high school golf team when they needed a girl for a match and started playing with the ladies at the club: Inez Blake, Martha Hogan, Eleanor Chappell, Jean Connelly, Chunk Allen and others. “They were nice enough to let me play with them and taught me the etiquette of the game and much more; I’ll never forget them,” she says.
“Fred King would have us high school kids out late in the afternoon pulling crab grass off the greens by hand and working on divots,” she recalls. “It was an outlet for us and a peaceful place to be. Some people play board games, but golf was our family thing. I can still see the course in my mind and there’s a real tradition out there.”
Joe, the youngest Hamilton, tagged along with his dad to the course when he was 7 or 8 years old. “I’d play with the pro’s son, Trip King, while Daddy played golf,” he says. “When I got a little older, I had two five irons and a putter and used to chase golf balls around the course.”
At East Montgomery in the mid 80s, Joe played on the golf team coached by his dad, using clubs donated by Jack Nicklaus, who was friends with Star businessman Andy Hacksaylo. “The first or second year of the team, we finished first in the conference,” he recalls.
Unlike his older siblings, Joe never worked at the local course as a kid, but he’s been working there since March, helping get the course back in shape. “I always enjoyed being outside, working with flowers and gardens, and worked at Wildwood Greens in Raleigh when Bill was director of golf there,” he explains. He has also worked at the prestigious Forest Creek course in Pinehurst and Beacon Ridge in Seven Lakes.
“The course has changed since I was little, it’s longer, there are new tees and the greens have been redone,” he says. “It’s been up and down the last few years and we’re trying to bring it back up to par from not being properly cared for the last few years.”
He still plays when he gets the chance and admits to being the longest hitter in his family. He credits golf with helping him learn good ethics and social skills that carry over into life. Through golf he’s met people he might not otherwise, Michael Jordan, Dean Smith and famed course designer Tom Fazio.
He’s looking forward to helping Densons Creek superintendent Van Parks make the course the best it can be, a course people know about with a good reputation.
“Our family’s roots in golf are here and I’m really happy to be back,” he says.
James and Betty are justifiably proud of their family and all they’ve accomplished through golf. Betty says of the early days, “We always knew they were safe on the golf course.”
“We really appreciate what the club has meant to our children and we think it’s wonderful that youngsters will have a place to go, a good atmosphere like our children had when they were coming along,” he says.
