ELY — On a cool, windy Friday morning, a restless group of young golfers gathered outside the clubhouse at the Ely Golf Club for the final day of the club’s annual youth golf camp.
Low clouds drifted overhead as occasional sprinkles swept across the course. Five groups of campers clustered around volunteer coaches while organizer Mary Levar handed out final instructions, reminding youngsters to stay behind the person hitting the ball, pay attention to safety, and listen to their coaches.
And, she reminded them, don’t forget to thank the parents and grandparents who sent them to camp.
Within minutes, the crowd broke apart. Golf bags were loaded into carts. Kids squeezed into carts three and four to a seat. Clubs rattled as coaches did quick head counts and groups headed toward their assigned holes.
For the next two hours, the course belonged almost entirely to the youngsters.
The four-day camp brought about 40 children ages 8 to 14 to the Ely Golf Club, supported by 14 volunteer coaches and helpers. Funding assistance from Morse Township helped offset program expenses, while club members donated time, equipment, and plenty of encouragement.
For 80-year-old volunteer coach Frank Guldbrandsen, encouragement was every bit as important as instruction.
A retired educator now in his fifth year with the program, Guldbrandsen didn’t even take up golf himself until his 60s. What keeps bringing him back, he said, is the opportunity to help young people discover a game they can enjoy for the rest of their lives.
“What we’re doing more than teaching is allowing them to be out here with a little bit of organization,” he said. “We’re creating an atmosphere that’s friendly to the game. They learn how to fix their divots. They learn how to take turns. They learn how to not be Happy Gilmore.”
Most golfers know Happy Gilmore as the Adam Sandler movie character who transformed from hockey player to golfer while bringing a chaotic hockey player’s approach to the game.
The coaches at Ely’s youth camp were teaching something different.
They were less concerned with how far youngsters could hit the ball than with how they treated the course, their fellow golfers and themselves.
Throughout the morning, they offered advice on grips, putting, and course etiquette. But they spent just as much time encouraging youngsters, celebrating good shots, and making sure nobody got left behind.
For Levar, now in her third year helping organize the camp, those lessons are intentional.
“We want it to be fun,” she said. “All of the coaches are encouraging the kids, but they’re also commenting on their character and behavior. We’re celebrating them as young people who are learning to be responsible for the golf course and responsible to each other.”
Golf naturally teaches patience, she said, along with awareness of both one’s own actions and the people around them.
Those lessons begin from the moment camp starts.
Campers are grouped largely by skill level rather than age. Younger golfers spend more time learning fundamentals through putting, chipping, and range work, while more experienced players venture onto the course earlier and play additional holes.
Safety remains a constant focus.
“We really emphasize it,” Levar said. “We’ve had nearly 40 kids out here with golf clubs and golf balls for three years now and we haven’t had an injury. That’s pretty amazing.”
Out on the course Friday, another lesson was equally apparent.
Encouragement.
On one green, youngsters took turns attempting putts up a steep slope. More than once, a ball climbed almost to the top before slowing, turning and rolling all the way back down.
The golfers laughed.
The coaches laughed.
Then somebody lined up another putt and tried again. Nobody got mocked. Nobody got excluded.
On the fairways, similar scenes played out throughout the morning. Some youngsters needed several attempts before connecting with the ball. Each miss brought another suggestion from a coach or a few words of support from waiting golfers. When a clean shot finally sailed down the fairway, the reaction often sounded as if somebody had holed out a tournament-winning putt.
The atmosphere reflected what Levar said coaches work hard to create.
“When we see something starting to get negative or shaming, or something that could make a kid feel badly about themselves, we address it,” she said. “We want them encouraging each other. We want them saying, ‘Good shot.’”
And the youngsters aren’t the only ones learning lessons at golf camp.
Volunteer coach David Young got some coaching of his own from an unexpected source.
“When I first started doing this, I tried to give them too much information and I was boring them to death,” he said with a laugh. “My wife finally told me, ‘Stop talking and let them play golf.’ That was really good advice.”
These days, Young still teaches fundamentals, but in smaller doses.
“Every now and then I’ll tuck a little information in,” he said. “Suggest how they can change their grip, change their stance, make sure they have an aiming point. But mostly they’re out here playing golf.”
The youngsters, he said, respond well.
“They’re really great kids. I can’t emphasize how nice they are. They’re respectful, they’re grateful, they say thank you. We stress safety and etiquette, but they really respond to it.”
His point was reinforced a short time later.
One camper who had just launched a perfectly respectable tee shot asked his coach if he could try a Happy Gilmore swing.
The request drew laughs.
The coach let him do it.
For a brief moment, the famous hockey-player-turned-golfer made an appearance on the Ely Golf Club course, in an atmosphere of both respect and fun.
Then it was back to regular golf.
By noon, the quiet concentration of the golf course had given way to the controlled chaos of a room full of hungry children.
Campers packed the clubhouse for a luncheon of hot dogs, sloppy joes, fruit, chips and desserts while coaches and volunteers circulated among the tables.
Conversations overlapped. Chairs scraped across the floor. Laughter bounced off the walls. At times, it was difficult for this reporter to hear individual answers above the excited din.
For the campers, however, the highlights of the week were remarkably easy to identify.
Holiace, attending for the first time, said his favorite part was hitting the ball as far as possible.
Asa also enjoyed learning the game, even if he admitted golf turned out to be harder than he expected. By Friday, he felt he had improved considerably.
Driving the ball emerged as the overwhelming favorite activity.
“It feels good to hit it really hard,” said returning camper Sawyer Anderson.
Sawyer had convinced his friend Wyatt Carlson to sign up this year and afterward offered an enthusiastic assessment of Wyatt’s first week.
“He did really well for a beginner,” Sawyer said. “I was really surprised.”
Not every youngster was focused on power.
James, who said he’d been attending the camp “for more years than I can count,” particularly enjoyed chipping around the greens, one of golf’s more subtle skills and one that depends more on touch than strength.
Melissa Buss, who coached the youngest group of campers, said watching those skills develop over four days was especially rewarding.
“At the beginning they knew some things, but not a lot,” she said. “By the end of the week, they were all doing extremely well. Their skill set greatly improved.”
But Buss said golf instruction wasn’t what stood out most.
“I think the most fun was the sense of community among all of the coaches and all of the children,” she said. “We came together at the beginning of the week as one big team and then came together again at the end of the week to celebrate.”
That celebration included more than lunch.
Before heading home, each camper received a membership card allowing them to play at the Ely Golf Club throughout the summer when accompanied by an adult.
For youngsters without equipment, the club also maintains a youth equipment shed stocked with clubs available for use.
The goal, Levar said, is to make sure cost doesn’t become a barrier.
In reality, camp doesn’t end when lunch is over.
It continues throughout the summer as youngsters return to the course with parents, grandparents, friends and siblings.
That opportunity exists because volunteers like Guldbrandsen continue investing their time in the next generation of golfers.
“It’s the least I can do,” he said. “There’s a lot of family history here at the golf club, and I appreciate the opportunity.”
Some of the youngsters who filled the clubhouse Friday will undoubtedly become serious golfers.
Others will move on to different sports and different interests.
But all of them spent a week surrounded by adults who taught lessons extending beyond golf itself. The golf clubs were simply the tools.
The real lesson was learning how to play the game, and perhaps life, without too much Happy Gilmore.