The first meeting was in Las Vegas at the Dunes Hotel. Here we had representatives from Washington, Dallas, California and Memphis. This meeting was to hammer out outlines for the formation of our national, and a constitution was formulated after much hashing and rehashing. Lemuel Osbourne, Foster Kidd, Dan Evans, C.c. Jones, John( Joe D) Saunders, Eugene Sills, Roosevelt Bush, and many others put together a constitution that was deliberately vague in certain areas since it was felt that each chapter should have the latitude to carry out their internal functions without interference from the National. It was never our intent to become a mammoth organization, rather, we wanted to be like the Marines and concentrate on having "a few good men" of integrity who had a lot in common and who liked to have fun while playing golf.  

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If we could find a great many good men then more power to us. Basic issues related to tournament sites (should be at a resort) were put into place, and the minimum number of members for a new chapter etc was agreed to by all. At this meeting, Milton Bernard was voted in as the first National President and Foster Kidd the Vice President. Joe "D" Saunders was the tournament Director and Sewell Horad the Treasurer. We voted to return to the Dunes the following year to begin a National Organization (1986) and did so in fine fashion.

The tenure of President was agreed upon to be two-year terms. Foster Kidd assumed the Presidency after Milton Bernard's first term. At our initial meeting, it had been agreed that the Presidency would rotate from Chapter to Chapter so that there would be an opportunity for each Chapter to be integrally involved with the leadership of the club. Leon Griffin, Lemuel Osbourne, Dan Evans, Larry Brown, Bill Cochran, and Tom Sweeney have all carried the mantle very well.

 

Milton Bernard has had the privilege to serve in this capacity twice. At one of the National meetings, Lem Osbourne made a point that we ought to begin hosting some of our affairs in our local jurisdictions and thus became the genesis of the National Spring Fling. Memphis already had their Spring Fling in place and the ability to expand this into National activity was fairly easy to effect. The thought process behind this was that this would not be as extensive and expensive an affair as the fall convention. Hence guys could room together or go stag, play poker at nights etc. This has evolved into quite an event.

Lastly, the emblem that represents the Pro-Duffers was designed and developed by the significant other of DC Duffer William Carr (deceased). Her name is Sharon Condon and we are all appreciative other creative efforts. This is a minor synopsis of our Genesis.

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Mel Blackwell

Past National President

Washington Chapter

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