For almost 100 years, tourists, Tillamook County residents, including many young people and retirees like myself, have appreciated Alderbrook Golf Course’s recreational value. The closing of the course and restaurant have clearly been a disruption of pleasure to many of us who have cherished this property and it’s amenities for a lifetime. The course has offered enjoyment since 1924.
Two elite groups, whose agendas have been altered by Laviolette Holdings closing the course, are the Tillamook High School Boys and Girls golf teams. They often traveled to Quail Valley golf course in Banks, Oregon just to practice. A trip of 100 miles. Coach John Begin and his teams drove 2,340 miles to keep golf alive last year for THS. This must surely impact their competitive play. The boys team finished 6th in the state and Elliot Lee won the individual championship. Elliot, a junior, returns this year to defend his title.
The Gary Anderson charity golf tournament, which enjoyed success for over 35 years, benefited those who relied on it for better hearing health through Gary’s noble effort. This charitable event is now on hold until a decision is made on Alderbrook’s sale and the owner’s next move. I remember fondly participating in many of these tournaments with my friends, and my brothers.
In 1950, when I started playing golf during high school in Tillamook, the course’s owner was Walt Pangborn. He also had a dairy farm next to the course and used parts of the present property to graze cows. The Number 9 fairway we know today was a pasture. For the cows to get to the pasture, they had to cross the Number 1 fairway. So, if you were ready to tee off on Number 1 you might have to wait for the herd of cows to cross first before hitting your shot. I remember when an impatient golfer did tee off and hit one of the cows. Mr. Pangborn kicked him off the course. Both men were rightly quite upset.
After Mr. Pangborm sold, Babe True ran the course in the 1950s through my high school and college years of playing. The next owner, a Mr. Steele, bought the course and turned it into an eighteen hole layout, using the remaining dairy farm property.
I remember vividly making a hole-in-one with an eight iron on the “hill hole” (which was hole Number 3 when the course was 9 holes). My next hole-in-one came 50 years later to the month, August, and again with an eight iron. This second one was at the beautiful Phoenician Resort in Scottsdale, Arizona, but is still not as sentimental to me as the first one.
In the winter of 1951, it snowed in Tillamook. Some of my high school friends, Bud Gienger, Calvin Huesser, Joyce Karn, and Don Norris, sledded down the ‘hill hole” in the middle of the night with me. We built a fire at the top between the Number 3 green and the Number 4 tee. It was a wonderfully magical night as the lights below shone brightly. This has been a well-kept secret until now.
The “hill hole” tee was located more in front of the hill, and you had to walk (or climb) to the green when the course was nine holes. There wasn’t a cart path. Golf carts in the 1950s weren’t as prolific as they are today so golfers carried their clubs or used a pull-cart. Sometimes a golfer took three or four shots to get up to the green. The golfer then had to come down the hill after hitting a tee shot on Number 4. We were extremely careful coming down because of the steepness. The ‘hill hole” was not for the faint of heart.
When Alderbrook was a nine hole course, it played more closely to a links description. The fairways were not smooth or level, but more undulating. Many times, your lye in the fairway would be a little uphill or downhill depending on your luck. And the course was more open, without many trees. You could be playing on the old hole Number 8 and see who was playing on hole Number 1.
In 1953, my senior year at THS, our revered teacher and coach, Barney Swanson, scheduled a golf match for us at Alderbrook with Seaside High School. This was the first boys golf match at THS. Tillamook won by a couple of strokes.
I remember some of the players from the 1950s and their traits that set them apart from each other. Rod George had a driver with a metal head. Many of us thought he was a little different. Now most drivers are metal. Don Shelton could drive the green on the first hole with a 1950 Persimmon (wood) head driver with a stainless steel shaft. My good friend, Dick Lundy, consistently parred the course when he was 15 years old. We all looked up to him, wishing we played as well.
My wish is for the golf course to be maintained in some manner and to continue the history of a golf course in Tillamook County. And to serve the community well as it had in the past.
While teaching at Canby High School, Earl Llewellyn Goldmann founded and coached the girls golf team for 25 years. He is retired and working on his third memoir about his life in Oregon. He currently watches golf, with his wife Patricia, where he lives in Scottsdale, Arizona.
