For someone who has been in golf as long as PGA of America Golf Professional Dave Kendall, “Play it as it lies” is more than one of the foundational Rules of Golf – it’s also a way of approaching life off the course. This steady way of taking life one shot at a time helped Kendall build a career that led him to induction in the Michigan Golf Hall of Fame in 2015, with laurels including two Michigan PGA Golf Professional of the Year awards, two Michigan Senior Open Championship titles and a two-year term as Michigan PGA President.
Kendall’s approach was put to the test nearly a year ago, when a barely noticeable bump by his collarbone led to a diagnosis of Stage 4 esophageal cancer, which had already spread to his brain and other parts of his body. Recovery from surgery to remove a tumor from his brain caused Kendall to spend weeks in bed – and wonder what the future held.
“For six or seven weeks, I couldn’t eat or swallow, my weight dropped to around 120 pounds and I had a headache so bad that I was afraid to fall asleep because it might be worse when I woke up,” remembers Kendall, a co-owner of Washtenaw Golf Club in Ypsilanti, Michigan. “When I was finally able to get out of bed, I dragged myself to the golf course and played a round with my old friend Dennis Walters, and I was so weak I thought as I was walking off the course that I’d just played my last round of golf.”
Fortunately for Kendall and his large network of PGA of America friends and family, he found his lie improving. He became healthy enough to start chemotherapy, and his tumors started shrinking. He began regaining his strength and stamina, along with some weight, and started making golf a regular part of his life again at Washtenaw Golf Club.
“I started walking every morning on July 10, and I haven’t missed a day – I walked four miles this morning,” says the 70-year-old Kendall, who returned to Michigan in mid-February after wintering in Florida. “I started being able to play golf, and let’s just say I’ve learned to do more with less on the course. When I’m in Michigan, I’m at Washtenaw pretty much every day.
“As long as I’m living, I’m going to be playing.”
He also makes regular appearances at the nearby Kendall Academy at Miles of Golf, the popular teaching center he started in 1997 after 17 years at Cadillac (Michigan) Country Club in the state’s northern Lower Peninsula.
In addition to his Hall of Fame career, Kendall also has a unique place in PGA of America history. He enrolled in the second class of the then-new PGM Program at Ferris State University in February 1976 and was part of the program’s first graduating class. He and his classmate Phil Benson earned the distinction of becoming the first PGM graduates to become PGA of America Head Professionals when they both started jobs on April 1, 1981 – Kendall at Cadillac, and Benson at Itasca (Illinois) Country Club.
With the PGA Golf Management University Program at Ferris State celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, Kendall is happy to have been an early success story for a program that has made a major impact on the golf business.
“I’m very proud to be part of what started at Ferris State in the PGM,” Kendall says. “I just played golf with Phil Benson recently, and we even got married on the same date.”
Kendall met his wife Karen on the Ferris State campus when both worked for longtime PGA of America Golf Professional and Ferris State Golf Coach Norm Bennett, and the pair is still happily together a half-century later, both part of the Washtenaw Golf Club ownership group and glad to be leaving a legacy in golf.
As for his health, Kendall continues to respond well to treatment, though he knows his cancer is incurable. He has exceeded the life expectancy doctors gave him after his diagnosis, and is embracing the chance to start another season of golf in his home state.
“I’m so glad my diagnosis didn’t mean my life was over, and I’ve had so many good things happen since – to be honest, I haven’t had one sad moment,” Kendall says. “I mean, how could a guy be 70 and have all these great things happen in his life and be sad?
“I was so lucky to have learned from someone like Norm Bennett that the best way to elevate yourself is to elevate others, and to learn how to help people believe in themselves through golf. That’s the secret to being a golf professional, and I’ve enjoyed every minute of it.” —Don Jozwiak
