When I was growing up, the Powelton Club was the fancy-pants-wear-a-striped-tie-to-dinner country club in Newburgh. The Patterson family didn’t belong. Not even close. We didn’t have the money, we didn’t have the right résumé, and I guess we didn’t much care about status. I still don’t.
As a kid, I was occasionally invited to swim in the Powelton Club pool. I thought it was pretty enough, with a really high diving board, but kind of overrated if all you wanted to do was cool off on a hot, muggy summer day. Just another swimming hole, only reeking of chlorine. Lots of frolicking kids with big smiles, cowlicks or ponytails, and heavy-looking braces straightening out their teeth.
I wasn’t a golf caddie at the club but a friend of mine, Tommy Hefferon, was. When we were in ninth grade, a professional golfer, Tommy Bolt, came to the club to play an exhibition round. My friend worked a deal so that he and I caddied for Bolt and his foursome.
“Thunder” Bolt was infamous on the PGA tour for having a hot temper. He was also called “Terrible-Tempered Tommy.” But he was a very good golfer who won the 1958 U.S. Open and was inducted into the Golf Hall of Fame.
That afternoon at the Powelton Club, I was nervous. I didn’t play golf. I didn’t even know the rules of golf. The front nine went okay without any memorably embarrassing incidents. Then we got to the tenth hole, yet another tight driving hole at Powelton.
As I remember it, Terrible Tommy pushed his drive to the right. It landed in some high grass and weeds. Shouldn’t have been a problem. Except that when my friend and I got out there, we couldn’t find Terrible Tommy’s ball. That almost didn’t seem possible. But we looked everywhere, looked again, and there was no golf ball to be found.
Tommy Bolt went bird shit. Then he went bat shit. He was cursing us out. “You little…how could you lose my ball…in those bushes…in that grass?”
Tommy had a point. I didn’t know how we lost the ball either. My caddie buddy and I were mystified. The ball must have hit a rock and sailed God only knew where, and He wasn’t inclined to help out Terrible Tommy.
Somehow, we finished the round with Bolt and the well-heeled amateurs in his foursome. We got a minuscule tip to split between us. Then my friend and I walked along the rough of the golf course, heading home.
Suddenly my friend started laughing. He reached deep into a pants pocket, pulled out a ball, and said, “Got Tommy Bolt’s ball.” He’d plucked the pro’s golf ball out of the weeds. It didn’t seem that funny to me at the time—but what a great line. Tommy Hefferon had stolen Bolt’s golf ball out of the low grass.
In retrospect, it was hilarious. Got Tommy Bolt’s ball!
Occasionally, I play the Powelton Club these days with pals Mike Smith, Bob Hatfield, and Tommy Hefferon. The personnel at the Powelton are always very nice to us. I usually sign a few autographs and I always have a laugh when we play the tenth hole. It’s still tight. But I haven’t lost a ball there yet.