Great golf supporting even greater causes arrives in Fayetteville Saturday, Aug. 23, with the 38th Annual Fayetteville Rotary Club-hosted Walker Family Golf Classic. Registration at the host course, King’s Grant Golf & Country Club at 347 Shawcroft Rd., Fayetteville, is from 7 a.m. to 8 a.m., with the tee-off at 8:30 a.m.
Since 1986, the Fayetteville Rotary has hosted the annual Walker tournament, originally the Fayetteville Rotary Father-Son Golf Championship of Cumberland County. Over the years, the Classic has expanded to include fathers and daughters, grandfathers and grandsons, mothers and daughters, mothers and sons, brothers, nephews and uncles, and other family duos. Today, the Walker, renamed in 2015 for the event’s founder, former Rotary Club President Joe Walker, welcomes a wider variety of players.
FRC Director and Chair of the Tournament Committee Tim Richardson explained the tournament’s foundation.
“It originally started as a true father-son golf tournament, almost identical to the tournament (now the Carolinas Parent Child Championship) held annually by the Carolinas Golf Association, the CGA, in Pinehurst. They use many courses because it’s such a big event. And Joe Walker played in it with his sons. He loved it so much, and he thought it would be a great thing for us to have here in Cumberland County, and that the Rotary Club could do it. So that’s how it started,” he said. “And even before Joe’s death, we said, you know, there are so many people that have loved playing in this tournament and golf in general, we’re going to change the format and make this a family golf championship. So, if your team (of two) is of a family relation, you can play.”…