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There are few places as peaceful and panoramic as Grandfather Golf & Country Club in the tiny mountain hamlet of Linville, North Carolina, an exquisite design that sits beneath the western slope of its namesake peak in the ancient Blue Ridge Mountains.
Created by Ellis Maples with help from Aggie Morton, whose family owned the mountain, Grandfather manages the rare feat of having a golf course that’s as good as the scenery that surrounds it. With the mountaintop never far from view and with trout-speckled streams gurgling throughout the property, Grandfather annually ranks among the top courses in a golf-rich state, usually settling for No. 2 behind Pinehurst No. 2.
Since 2007, Chip King has been the head professional at Grandfather, fitting the place like a favorite sweatshirt to ward off the mountain chill that takes the edge off the summer heat broiling a couple thousand feet down the hills. He understands the vibe and the values of Grandfather, a summer club of 460 member families, and, as he approaches his 68th birthday, King is as much a part of the place as the black bears that call the mountain home.
“There is nothing like driving across the spillway coming into the club, seeing the mountain and the clubhouse and that feeling you get,” King said. “It’s a very special place.”
It’s a long way from Toronto, Canada, where King was raised, growing up on hockey in the winter and golf in the summer. He learned the game from his father, Bud, who coached him in both sports. Once King learned he could make a living working in a pro shop like the ones he liked to hang around, he became hooked.
After working with pro Dave Ellis at Muskoka Lakes Golf and Country Club in Port Carling, Ontario, King decided – with his parents’ permission – to move to the United States to pursue his career. He wanted to go to Florida for the winter and, along the way, he stopped in Pinehurst.
The year was 1976 and King began cold-calling clubs in the Pinehurst area. He showed up at the gate at the prestigious Country Club of North Carolina and talked his way inside. He had never heard of Buck Adams, a legendary club pro in the state, but found him in the golf shop that fortuitous day, not realizing how infrequently Adams was inside.
Before he left CCNC, King had a job there. Adams told him if he would work one month on the outside, he’d bring him in the shop thereafter. That’s the way it happened and King’s career was launched.
“When I gave my (Carolinas PGA) Hall of Fame speech a few years ago, I talked about getting in that gate,” King said. “If I hadn’t gotten in, my career would have been very different.”
Among his many talents, Adams had a knack for developing young professionals and he became the go-to source when clubs went looking for club pros. Combined with the explosive growth of golf in the Carolinas in the late 1970s and early 1980s, King found himself in the right spot.
He got his first head professional job at Highland Country Club in nearby Fayetteville, North Carolina, and soon thereafter became head pro at Mid Pines Country Club. After 10 years there, Peggy Kirk Bell and her family purchased Mid Pines, putting it together with Pine Needles – which has hosted three U.S. Women’s Opens – and King was director of golf at both places.
Working for Adams and Bell provided a master class in being a golf professional.
“From Buck, I watched how the members respected him and held him in such high esteem and how he carried himself,” King said. “I wanted to be that type of professional.
“He and coach (Dean) Smith were great friends and he watched how coach Smith stayed in touch with his former players. He did the same thing. They were called ‘Buck’s boys’ and were part of a special fraternity.
“We’re in an unbelievably beautiful place. It doesn’t get any better than what we have here."
Chip King
“From Mrs. Bell, I learned about hospitality and graciousness. Whenever she would do her golf schools, she would bring in some of the best teachers in the game – Jim Flick, Dana Rader, Harvie Ward – and I had the opportunity to work with them. Without her family I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to be at Grandfather.”
Grandfather opens the first week of May and closes at the end of October, just after the mountain leaves have turned and the air turns chilly. This summer has been particularly busy with the work-at-home environment created by the pandemic, King said.
In the offseason, King spends time recruiting staff – he typically employs up to 20 people annually – and planning for the next year. Among his protégés are A.J. Sikula, head pro at Inverness Club in Toledo, Ohio; Don Farr, who directed the PGA golf management program at Florida State University; and Rob Pilewski, head golf professional at Duke University golf course.
“The teaching and service side was where I devoted myself,” King said. “I would play in pro-ams but I was never a competitive golfer … but I could play hockey.
“We’re in an unbelievably beautiful place. It doesn’t get any better than what we have here. The membership makes this club so significantly good and they make us feel like I’m a part of this.”
Top photo: No. 4 at Grandfather Golf & Country Club
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