A Son of the Game: A Story of Golf and Fatherhood by James Dodson

Author:James Dodson [Dodson, James]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Workman Publishing
Published: 2010-04-12T16:00:00+00:00

“EVERYTHING IN PINEHURST and to some extent the Sandhills at large is connected by three main things,” Peter said, expanding on Dempsey’s theme as we followed the boys along the back nine of the Dogwood Course. “One is golf, the other is family relations, the third is Pinehurst politics. Whatever the resort wants, it gets, for the most part.”

In many minds, including my own, the family-owned Pine Crest was more an enduring symbol of Pinehurst’s timeless charms than either the stately Carolina Hotel or the lovely Holly Inn next door, both owned since around 1980 by massive ClubCorp of Dallas. So, like a canary in a coal mine, whatever happened to the Pine Crest was bound to affect life in the self-described home of American golf.

This was no rap against the Carolina or the Holly Inn. World-class hostelries, logically evolved from the remnants of James Tufts’s original utopian scheme, these first-rate resort hotels aggressively catered to large and sophisticated travel segments, including a major portion of the state’s corporate convention trade.

But the Pine Crest was something else entirely, folksy and soulfully threadbare in the same welcoming way as certain older golf clubs in Britain, conveying a patina of grace and conviviality that many golf travelers find irresistible. Once, while playing golf with former Pinehurst Resort General Manager Pat Corso, a delightful Dempsey golf crony and potential Idle Knight in his own right, I casually wondered why the resort had never made a play to acquire the Pine Crest. After all, they owned the Holly Inn on one side of the Pine Crest and the Manor Inn on the other.

“Oh, believe me, that possibility has been discussed by management since the days of Leonard Tufts,” Pat responded without hesitation. “Fortunately we’ve always had the wisdom to realize the only thing we would do if we were ever lucky enough to acquire the inn would be to thoroughly screw it up. Why ruin a perfect anachronism like the Pine Crest? Folks would hate us.”

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