About

I became enamored with golf at an early age when my dad would allow me to tag along Saturday mornings with his weekly golf group. I played with my dad’s wedge, teed off with his old Walter Hagen sawed-off driver, and eventually progressed to creating chipping greens in the backyard. I couldn’t get enough of the game.

At 16 I had my first dream job helping to add 9 holes to Balmoral GC, working under Arnie Hemquist--owner, designer, and builder. Spending the summer doing mundane jobs like picking rocks and sticks, graduating to chainsaw work and washout repair, somehow only enhanced my love for the golf course.

When I discovered  there was a program called Turfgrass Management at Michigan State University (where Arnie’s son Mike was enrolled), my career path was set. This led to my days on the Fergus Falls High School golf team, summers on the Pebble Lake GC maintenance staff, an internship at Oakland Hills CC outside Detroit, and my degree in Turf grass Management from Michigan State University in 1975.

At just 21 I was hired by Jim Madden to take over the reigns of Madden’s 45-hole golf operation, coming from 9-hole Mitchell CC in South Dakota. Quite a change. But my naive outlook was same thing just more of it. It didn’t take long for my veteran crew to “educate” me!

In those days we were a do-it-yourself operation on the golf course, leading to many opportunities to design and build numerous greens, tees, and features. As the design bug hit  both from the standpoint of necessity and passion, I attended every design seminar available across the country--learning from many of the top modern architects in the business: Michael Hurdzan, Geoffrey Cornish, Robert Trent Jones Jr., Von Hagge, Jay Morrish, Ron Forse, and Forrest Richardson to name a few.

I also began collecting a library of “Golden Age” golf architecture books dating back to the 1920s, which further fueled my passion for golf course architecture.

Some of my favorite books were by Robert Hunter, George Thomas Jr., Donald Ross, and Alister MacKenzie. Mackenzie’s book “The Spirit of St. Andrews” was a game changer for me, both for his design philosophy and practical approach to greenskeeping, given his Scottish roots. His design philosophy to “leave a broad and pleasurable road that leads to destruction” is very evident at Augusta National--with its comparatively few bunkers and scant rough. The course challenges the best in the world and still provides great pleasure for the average golfer.

Two “study” trips to Great Britain have also been very influential, with St. Andrews, Royal Dornoch, and Machrihanish at the top of the list.  All excellent examples of minimalist style and construction offering great challenge, pleasure, and maintainability.

I spent years becoming intimate with a 220 acre wooded property owned by Madden’s: designing golf holes while cross country skiing or hiking the land and studying the topography map. The time finally came for Madden’s to build a championship golf course.  When Brian Thuringer offered me the rare opportunity to not only design but to manage the construction of The Classic, I was ready with a plan. I just needed to find a good consultant. Three came to mind. Geoffrey Cornish, Warren Rebholz, and John Harris came on to fill that role beautifully. The Classic opened in 1997 as a Golf Digest Public top 100 and has remained there to this day.

I am very thankful to my wife Jewell and daughter Brandy and son Nick for their support and sacrifice allowing me to devote the time necessary to design and build The Classic over a 3-4 year period. Their love and devotion were and continue to be a great inspiration to me.

After 10 years of great success, The Classic’s pure bent grass greens were being contaminated by poa Annua. Only 5-15%, but it was enough to disrupt the trueness of the putting surface. We knew from our existing golf courses, with surfaces ranging from 30-80 years old, that the issue would get progressively worse unless we took action. This is when we brought in Greenway Golf from California with their very successful  protocols for bent grass management.

With modifications I made for both the Minnesota Climate and three completely different types of greens on our three golf courses, we were able to reverse the tide. In three years and without negatively affecting play (in fact, with much less disruption to play than our traditional approach), we were able to transform all of our putting surfaces from 5-70% poa Annua back to pure bent grass.

Now after 10 years the program’s success is proven and an integral part of Madden’s maintenance protocol. The Classic continues to be a top rated golf course, and the East and West courses are very popular--known for their exceptional putting surfaces.

It is with great anticipation that I approach the next stage of my career, contributing my design and maintenance expertise to help golf courses remain competitive, affordable, and a joy to play.