Golf Summer 2018

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EDITOR’S LETTER
Bill Brotherton
bbrotherton@essexmediagroup.com
Trump gets the swing vote
When it comes to golf, no U.S. president has played the game
better than Donald J. Trump. During his term, his handicap has
wavered from 3 to 5. His scores are almost always in the 70s.
Granted, that might not be as impressive at the 38-under-par
34 reportedly shot by the late North Korean despot Kim Jong-il,
but no resident of the White House has come closer.
Massachusetts’ favorite son John F. Kennedy had a single
digit handicap, but odds are Trump would’ve cleaned his clock in
a $10 Nassau.
Winthrop’s Mike Eruzione, captain of the 1980 Miracle on Ice
U.S. Olympic Gold Medal hockey team, can attest to Trump’s
prowess on the golf course. The Tedesco CC member recently
teed it up with the president at Trump International Golf Club in
West Palm Beach, Florida.
In this Summer issue of North Shore Golf, Eruzione, a pretty
fair golfer himself, talks about the man, the round, “presidential
mulligans” and defeating Phil Mickelson in a closest-to-the-pin
contest.
Gary Larrabee, in his Straight Down the Middle column, visits
with the Murphy clan of Haverhill. Ted and wife Mary, who are
celebrating the 50th anniversary as owners of Garrison Golf
Center, look back and talk about how their four children
embraced the game as well.
We also catch up with Bobby Baker, who is starting his
68th year at Lynnfield’s Reedy Meadows, and Winchester
native/Heisman Trophy winner Joe Bellino, a former member at
Hillview, Andover and Indian Ridge who now plays at Patriot Golf
Club in Bedford.
In his Shades of Green column, Tedesco pro Bob Green
examines Tee It Forward, a joint initiative of the PGA of America
and the United States Golf Association that's practically been
ignored by most golfers.
Also in this issue: For years, rock ‘n’ rollers were loath to
admit their love for the game. As Jim Sullivan, the longtime music
writer and now North Shore Golf columnist, writes “After all,
the song doesn’t run ‘Sex and golf and rock ‘n’ roll!” Alice Cooper,
Huey Lewis, former Gang of Four drummer/Gloucester resident
Hugo Burnham and other rockers share their thoughts about
the game with Sullivan on these pages.
More local clubs have joined the PGA Junior League, which,
local pros tell us, is succeeding in getting another generation
interested in the game. Course owners and superintendents
talk about the weird March weather that caused major
destruction throughout the region. And, Town Meeting in
Lynnfield shot down a development plan for Sagamore Spring
GC; what does this mean for one of the North Shore’s most
popular courses. There’s also plenty of breaking news in our
Notebook, including reports on how our local players fared in
numerous tournaments.
As always, we’d love to hear your thoughts and suggestions for
the magazine. Please let me know what you like, don’t like and
how we can make North Shore Golf better.
See you on the links. l
Bill Brotherton is editor of North Shore Golf magazine. He grew up in Beverly, caddied and worked in the pro shop at Essex CC, is a Ouimet Scholar who
graduated from Suffolk University, has written about golf for the Beverly Times and Daily Item of Lynn. He’s retired from the Boston Herald, where he wrote
about music and edited the Features section. Tell him what you think at bbrotherton@essexmediagroup.com.
NORTH SHORE GOLF