'What I want to be when I grow up’

After 37 1/2 years, there’s a new superintendent at the No. 1 course in the country, which is kind of a big deal. The old guy, Rick Christian, has retired at age 60, and therein lies a couple of stories. I was a new member at Pine Valley Golf Club when he was named head of agronomy at 22. He looked like he was still in high school, wearing short-shorts, a golf shirt and a smile from ear to ear. The club president was the legendary Ernie Ransome, and he told Rick he was going to take a chance on him, but if he failed, they’d probably both be going down together. Anybody who knew Ernie knew that wasn’t bloody likely. Ransome ran Pine Valley like Ivan IV, the first Tsar of Russia.

First, a little history: One of my early stories for Golf Digest was about Eb Steiniger, Pine Valley’s chief of police, head of civil defense and superintendent from 1927 until 1978. Everything about the 600 acres of Pine Valley was legendary. (Ransome’s predecessor was John Arthur Brown, who was president for 50 years.) Steiniger planted 3,500 saplings a year, turning a treeless landscape into the arboretum we know today. “Eb has an artistic talent for molding terrain to its natural beauty,” Ernie told me in 1981.

After Steiniger came Dick Bator, who was, to put it mildly, a bit of an eccentric. He took his job so seriously that he had a map of Pine Valley’s first hole tattooed on his right bicep. Bator and Ransome were like fire and dynamite, so it didn’t take long for Ernie to replace him with the kid who was his assistant superintendent.

This is where the story gets spooky.

When Rick was 14 years old, he wrote an essay for his eighth grade career-day assignment that has become part of the club’s mythology. “When I get old enough to work, I would like my occupation in the field of being a golf course superintendent,” it began. “This job would mostly deal with working outside on days that sometimes get up to 100 degrees. The different things that I would have to be familiar with on a course would be soils, fertilizers, irrigation, drainage, insects, insecticides, turf diseases, fungicides, weeds, herbicides and tools ranging from hand tools to complex hydraulically operated fairway mowing units. On days that it rained, I would probably stay inside working on tractors and mowing equipment.

“I like the occupation because I will mostly deal with working outside in the fresh air, and I would also like this job because it takes a great deal of hard work. Also, this job sometimes deals with getting up early, and I like to get up early before anyone else. I would much rather have this kind of job than working in some air-conditioned food store.”

Rick went on to write about the importance of a good education and wanting to go to college to study “agronomy, horticulture, entomology, plant pathology, landscape architecture, construction, accounting, meteorology, civil engineering and mechanics as well as public and labor relations.” The job had many advantages, he wrote, but “there is one big one, and that is being proud of all the work I do.”

Rick’s teacher must have been a tough grader. He got a B. I assume the other kids went on to become Nobel Laureates and Olympic gold medalists because that’s the equivalent of Rick’s delivery on his promise.

When club president Jim Davis announced Rick’s retirement at Pine Valley’s spring dinner in May, he gave him a new set of golf clubs and a Pine Valley green jacket symbolic of membership. “Welcome to the club, Rick,” Davis said, and all the handkerchiefs came out. I think the members are still applauding.

The successor as head of agronomy, Adam Wilkins (who had been an assistant superintendent at Pine Valley 2005-’10) is off to a great start. The course is in firm and fast condition, as good as ever, and why wouldn’t it be? Wilkins was trained by Christian, who was trained by Bator, who was trained by Steiniger. Better than working in some air-conditioned food store.