The Greatest Course That Never Was

by J. Michael Veron

  “Did any of you ask Clarence about it?”

  He looked at me wide-eyed. “I don’t believe so, lad. Some things ya’ don’t want to know ’bout. What was I gonna do ’bout it, anyway?”

  There was clearly no point in answering that question.

  It was getting late in the afternoon. I figured we only had maybe an hour or so of daylight left. I had no idea of how much farther we had to go to reach our destination, and we had made no arrangements for the night’s lodging.

  As if he had read my mind, Moonlight directed me to drive all the way to Fort Bragg. “We’ll stay the night there an’ get a fresh start in the mornin’”. Seeing my inquisitive expression, he added, “It ain’t far from there.”

  I smiled as if I had been vindicated. Before I could say anything, he mumbled almost to himself, “I get the feelin’ ya’ maybe knew that already.”

  It was almost 8:00 P.M. when we pulled into a Holiday Inn just east of Fort Bragg on Kaspar Boulevard off Highway 20. By venturing inland a few miles, we avoided the higher room rates of places selling ocean views or beach access. After checking in, the two of us were directed to a small diner across the street, where we ate our evening meal.

  At dinner, I tried to get Moonlight to tell me more about the course, but he was clearly determined to keep me in the dark. “Ya’ gotta see it first,” he said. “Ya’ can’t begin to understand the magic a’ the place until then.”

  He then distracted me by asking about what it was like to grow up in Birmingham, why I went to law school, and how long I had been playing golf. We had talked about some of the same things on his porch. Since I wasn’t sure if he just didn’t remember or was deliberately changing the subject, I played along. In typical fashion, Moonlight wasn’t going to show his cards until he was ready to do so.

  Chapter 12

  I HAD RENTED one room with two beds to save money. By sharing a room with Moonlight, I quickly learned two things about him that I hadn’t known before. He snored, and he was an early riser.

  I don’t know whether it was Moonlight’s snoring or the excitement of knowing I was about to see Moonlight’s secret course, but I wasn’t able to fall asleep until the early hours of the morning, when exhaustion finally overtook me. As a result, I overslept. By the time I woke up, it was close to 7:30 A.M. Moonlight wasn’t in the room.

  It turned out that he had been up since 5:00 A.M. In that time, he had showered, read the paper, eaten breakfast in the coffee shop, and had gone for a walk. I figured that he was scouting the area to regain his bearings from years past.

  He returned to the room just as I was getting dressed. I couldn’t resist a dig.

  “I’m sure so much has changed,” I said indulgently. “Are you sure you’ll be able to find this place?”

  He gave me a stern look. “I know exactly where it is, believe you me.”

  I asked him how long it had been since he had been on the course.

  “The last round was played on October 17, 1970. I was there ’til the end.”

  I was surprised by the date. “Was Jones still playing golf then?”

  He shook his head. “Nah, he hadn’t played in years. But he still loved bein’ out there. Rode ’round the course in a golf cart. It was the only one allowed on the grounds.”

  If Jones was no longer playing the course, I wondered who was. His face took on a mischievous smile when I asked him.

  “That’s the interestin’ part. Best I could tell, it came down to whether Mr. Jones an’ Mr. Roberts trusted ya’ with the secret. An’ there weren’t many they did. So we’d go days at a time without anyone playin’. Toward the end, those were the days Mr. Jones liked. He’d ride out on the course by himself an’ be gone for hours. We used to worry that somethin’ might’ve happened to him.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  He seemed almost annoyed by my question. “I’ve tol’ ya’ before, Mr. Jones didn’t like a lotta attention. An’ he didn’t like people seein’ him all crippled up like he was. But to his dyin’ day, he loved bein’ on that golf course.”

  Moonlight’s voice had faltered, and he paused for a moment to collect himself before continuing. “Ya’ see, he couldn’t do that at the National. Whenever he was on the grounds, it attracted a lotta attention. All the members an’ the people who worked there wanted to touch him, talk to him, whatever. He just didn’t want to be asked how he felt.”

  I felt his slight rebuke. “I still want to know who all played this private reserve.”

  He ignored me. Instead, he asked if I was hungry for breakfast. I was, so we headed down to the coffee shop.

  After we settled into a booth, I confronted him.

  “You know, Moonlight, you’ve asked me to help you tell this story, but I feel like I’m having trouble following you. It’s almost like we’re playing some kind of a game. That’s okay, but I can’t tell the story you want me to tell if I don’t understand it. You’ve got to help me a little more.”

  He seemed to appreciate my predicament. Putting down his coffee cup, he said, “I’m sorry, lad. Believe me, I’m not tryin’ to confuse ya’.”

  Sensing that I had an opportunity, I tried to take advantage. “What I really want to know is, who got to play there? Did they ever hold any tournaments of any kind there? Was there a clubhouse of any kind? Where did you and the other caddies live? And what did…”

  He held up his hand. “Whoa, son, I can’t keep up with ya’. Believe me, you’re gonna understand it all in the next few days.”

  I had finished my breakfast by that time. He drank the last of his coffee and said, “It’s time to complete your education.”

  I noticed that his eyes were suddenly brighter. As he stood up, Moonlight’s thin gray lips spread into a wide grin, and he said with unmistakable pride, “C’mon, ya’ need to see it.”

  I followed him out of the coffee shop and into the parking lot. We climbed into our rented Taurus. As I pulled out of the parking lot, he directed me back to Highway 1. When we reached the highway, he told me to follow the signs to Fort Bragg.

  For the first time, I felt a surge of childlike excitement, like the kind a seven-year-old feels on Christmas morning. I was about to become privy to a remarkable piece of golf history. I felt fortunate that Moonlight had decided to share his secret with me while he was still on this side of the grass.

  There were pictures in my head that had been developing slowly as Moonlight revealed more and more about the place. Thus, even though I really didn’t know what to expect, my imagination had conjured up some fairly graphic images of the secluded course. Now that I was about to confront the reality of it, I wondered how it would compare with the photo album in my brain.

  I was so deep in thought that the sign for Fort Bragg almost startled me. Moonlight pointed left and said, “Turn here.” We left the highway and headed down a large boulevard. A sign appeared every few hundred yards to warn that we were approaching a security checkpoint for Fort Bragg.

  Soon a huge gate and guardhouse appeared a quarter of a mile ahead of us. Another sign instructed us, “Please Have Appropriate Identification Ready.”

  I turned to Moonlight. “What do we do now?”

  He looked straight ahead. “Just keep drivin’.’”

  I slowed as we approached the main gate. An MP waved us forward. As we stopped by his side, he leaned down at my open window and asked for our credentials. Before I could tell him that we didn’t have any, Moonlight reached across me and handed him a tattered old card of some kind.

  I’ll never forget the look on the MP’s face when he saw that card. He turned toward the guardhouse and yelled, “Hey, Joe, come take a look at this.”

  An older MP with a look of foreboding appeared almost immediately. As soon as he saw Moonlight’s card, he blanched. Then he looked at me and said, “Sir, would you mind pulling your vehicle over to the side there for a minute?”

  I did as I was told, although I really didn’t know what to think of it a
ll. I had never been put in a military stockade, but I wondered for a minute whether that was where we were headed.

  As I turned off the engine, I heard the older MP say, “Man, it’s been years since I’ve seen one of these.” He then disappeared inside the guardhouse. I imagined that he was calling for reinforcements in the event we resisted our imminent arrest.

  In what seemed like a long time but was probably only a couple of minutes, he reappeared. As he was walking toward us, I heard him say to the other MP, “It’s still good.” He then reached across me to hand the card back to Moonlight.

  In an apologetic tone, he said to Moonlight, “Sorry to detain you, sir. But that’s an unusual card you’re carrying. It has one of our highest clearances, but it’s so old I had to check and see if it was still current.” Looking at me, he said, “That card is good for anyone in this gentleman’s company, but I must ask you to remain with him at all times while you’re inside the gate.” Turning back to Moonlight, he said, “Sir, if you will check with us here when you leave, we’ll have a new card for you with a bar code on it. It’ll make things easier for you in the future.”

  Moonlight had remained respectfully quiet the entire time. He simply nodded toward the MP and said “Thank you.”

  Needless to say, I was completely dumbstruck by this. After we cleared the gate, I turned to Moonlight. “Did you get that from a general or something? And why didn’t you tell me about it?”

  Moonlight just cackled. He had thoroughly enjoyed the scene at the gate, especially my befuddlement. After he let me dangle a bit, he said, “Probably for the same reason ya’ didn’t tell me ’bout the stuff at the airport.”

  Okay, we were even, I said.

  He couldn’t leave it at that. “I told ya’ that Mr. Jones an’ Mr. Roberts had friends in high places. I tol’ ya’ they got this property from the government. Ya’ gotta listen, Charley.”

  Turning back to the road, he pointed ahead and said, “There should be a road up here a coupla hundred yards ahead. It won’t be marked, so ya’ better slow down or we’ll miss it.”

  Sure enough, a road appeared right where he said it would. It wasn’t very wide, but it was paved. It obviously hadn’t been used very much, because weeds now grew tall through the cracks and expansion joints in the pavement, some as much as three feet high. Trees and other assorted vegetation encroached on both sides, effectively narrowing the road to the width of our car. As the brush scratched its sides, I caught myself wondering if I would get any of my security deposit back when we returned it to the airport.

  The road began a gentle and prolonged turn to our right. Combined with the heavy overgrowth, the result was that I couldn’t see more than 20 or 30 yards in front of us.

  Without taking my eyes off the road, I sought some reassurance from Moonlight. “Are you sure this is the way to go?”

  “I told ya’, I remember it like it was yesterday.”

  Just then we encountered a tall, fenced gate across the road. It was padlocked, and there was no way around it. It appeared to extend indefinitely into the woods on both sides of the road. It looked like we had reached the end of the road, literally and figuratively.

  I stopped the car and turned to Moonlight. “Well, what do we do now?”

  He was opening his door and pushing it into the brush that was against our car. As he struggled to get out, he said, “Just wait here a minute.” It then occurred to me that Moonlight hadn’t been surprised by the gate.

  I watched as he fought his way through the brush around to the front of the car. He walked confidently toward the gate, reached into his pocket and pulled out a key. Inserting the key into the padlock, he flipped it open and pushed the gate back. Standing aside, he then waved me through. Once I was past, he closed and relocked the gate.

  Moonlight then got back in the car as if nothing unusual had occurred. I just sat there staring at him. He finally turned to me impatiently and said, “Well, let’s get goin’. We don’t have much more to go.”

  “How long have you had that key?”

  “A long time,” he said. He then looked back toward the road. I took this to mean it was time to continue.

  After a couple of hundred yards, the trees and bushes became so thick that I had slowed the car to no more than 10 miles per hour. I was becoming pretty apprehensive about continuing. We were in the middle of a rather dense stand of trees, and I had lost all sense of direction. Even though there was no place to turn around, I asked Moonlight if we should turn back.

  He never took his eyes off the road and said, “Nah, it’s just up ahead.” It seemed like we had been driving a long time, but we probably hadn’t covered much distance given our slow rate of progress. We suddenly entered a clearing, and I saw it.

  Chapter 13

  I WAS TOTALLY unprepared for the magnificent scene that appeared before me. From where I stood, the land fell away for several hundred yards to the Pacific Ocean. Some of the ground swept down close to the water’s edge, while other portions abruptly terminated at rocky cliffs. I could see and hear the surf crashing on the rocks below. An occasional California fir, redwood, or cypress tree stood out above the native brush as the land cascaded down to the sea. The trees appeared to be separated by fire lanes of some kind. Then I realized that they weren’t fire lanes at all. They were fairways.

  Our visual feast was accompanied by an array of fragrances more potent than any scent from Paris. I tried to sort them out, but there were simply too many. It was as if someone has opened the door to a massive nursery that had been kept under seal. The aroma was deep, rich, and various shades of green.

  The next thing I saw was the clubhouse off to our left about a hundred yards away. It was small but elegant—and remarkably well preserved under the circumstances. I noticed that all of the windows were intact and that, aside from the aging white paint that was peeling in spots, it was in surprisingly good condition for property that had been abandoned over 30 years ago.

  There weren’t any signs of vandalism, which I would have expected to see. But then I remembered that this place was protected by two of the greatest forces known to man: Uncle Sam and Mother Nature. The chances of anyone making it back here with mischief in mind were minuscule.

  I stood there for quite some time. When I finally turned and looked over at Moonlight, he was watching me intently, grinning from ear to ear.

  At that moment, all of the questions and lingering doubts I may have had about our crazy mission—and about Moonlight—were suddenly gone. And I was very, very glad for whatever instinct had persuaded me to trust him when logic and common sense told me otherwise. I wanted to say that much and more to him, but the words wouldn’t come.

  “This is the damnedest thing I’ve ever seen,” was all I could manage to say.

  He laughed. “It’s more than that, Charley. There’s magic in this place. You’re gonna see it, believe me. An’ you’re gonna feel it, too.” He paused a minute before asking, “Are ya’ ready to do some explorin’?”

  “Lead the way.”

  Moonlight started walking toward the clubhouse. Without looking back, he began giving me a tour of the place. “The clubhouse here was different from anythin’ I’ve ever seen before or since. The caddies were allowed inside with the players. Everyone who shared the secret was equal.”

  The small white building had a large front porch typical of the Southern style of architecture with which Jones was so familiar. It faced the ocean, offering an inspiring vista to the players and caddies who must have gathered there after the day’s play.

  I entertained myself with wonderful thoughts of Jones and his friends drinking whiskey and conducting postmortems on the round they had just concluded. This porch, I speculated, was probably the place where money changed hands as bets were paid in full.

  As we stood there, Moonlight showed me where the first tee was located to our right and the eighth tee to our left. In front of us, he said, was the large green for the 18th hole. Anyone sitting
on the front porch could see a lot of golf—a lot of damned good golf.

  I started to ask a number of questions about the course, but he dismissed them. “Later,” he said and, pulling another key from his pocket, unlocked the front door of the clubhouse. I was trying not to be surprised by anything he did at this point.

  The door creaked as he pushed it open. As we stepped in, I was struck by the fact that the interior was as well preserved as the outside of the clubhouse. I turned to Moonlight. “Somebody’s been taking care of this place.”

  Moonlight shook his head. “No way, lad. I tol’ ya’, there ain’t no one else left.”

  “But this place is in really good shape for a building that’s been deserted all this time.”

  Moonlight just shook his head. “That’s part a’ the magic a’ Bragg’s Point, lad.”

  To our right was a door that led into a small but comfortable locker room. The lockers reminded me of Shinnecock Hills, which I had played the previous year with a friend. There were no more than a dozen of them, as well as three card tables, and what must have been a small bar. On the other side of the room were the showers and toilets. The place looked like it could be reopened with just a good spring-cleaning.

  Pointing to the tables, Moonlight said, “There used to be some hellacious gin games there. Mr. Hagen loved to take ’em all on. What he didn’t win on the course, he won at cards.”

  “Walter Hagen played here?”

  Moonlight smiled. “They all played here.”

  As we left the locker room, I saw a staircase to our right. “What’s up there?”

  “The bedrooms. An’ Mr. Jones’s room.”

  “I’ve got to see that,” I said and started walking to the stairs.

  Moonlight grabbed my arm. “Careful, lad. I don’t know if those stairs are safe.”

  I ignored his warning. “They look pretty good to me,” I said over my shoulder. Dust rose from the carpeted stairs with each step I took.