A lifelong member of the Carolinas PGA Section, ‘Flo’ put together an enviable career record – both on and off the course. The 1992 CPGA Professional of the Year and four-time CPGA Resort Merchandiser of the Year, Florence’s playing résumé includes two South Carolina Open titles, four South Carolina PGA Championships, a combined five Carolinas Pro-Pro and Pro-Assistant titles, one Carolinas Assistants Championship and the 1976 Mini Kemper title.

As a club professional, Florence qualified for four PGA Championships and twice represented the United States team in the PGA Cup Matches, the club professionals’ version of the Ryder Cup. Florence spent his entire career in Charleston, most notable as Director of Golf at Wild Dunes Resort and then Bulls Bay Golf Club.

Florence spent his entire career in Charleston, most notable as Director of Golf at Wild Dunes Resort and then Bulls Bay Golf Club.

Terry Florence was inducted into the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame in 2009.

He passed away in March, 2013 after a long battle with cancer.

Patricia J. Moore was born in Lodi Calif. and grew up in Lubbock, Tex. She attended college at Texas Tech University but didn’t play golf in high school or college and was only a weekend golfer until the mid 1980s. Her first statewide event was in Florida in 1985 and she went on to play in state championships in Louisiana and Virginia.

She has won 23 club championships, including 19 at Carmel Country Club, and six Moore County Amateur Championships. Her Carolinas Golf Association titles include four 4-Ball, two N.C. Senior, four Carolinas Senior, two Match Play championships, the 2007 Amateur, seven Senior Amateur Championships, two N.C. Women’s Golf Association championships, eight senior championships, the 2000 Women’s Southern Golf Association Championship and three Women’s Eastern Golf Association Seniors. She has competed in seven USGA Amateurs and 13 USGA Mid-Amateurs.

A four-time Carolinas Senior Player of the Year she was the first to win both the regular and senior division of the N.C. Amateur and was the first female golfer to win CGA Player of the Year honors in both regular and senior divisions in 2004 and 2007

Regarded by many as “Mr. Golf” in South Carolina, Happ Lathrop has presided over the game as executive director of the South Carolina Golf Association across four decades. In 1976, he became the first full-time employee of the South Carolina Golf Association when membership involved 99 clubs (about 11,500 golfers) and assets stood at $50,000. Today, 32 years later, the association commands more than $1-million in assets and represents the interests of more than 70,000 golfers across nearly 300 clubs.

A fine player in his own right, Lathrop won the state amateur championship in 1968 as an 18-year-old, becoming the youngest to do so at that time. He was South Carolina Inter-Collegiate Champion in the same year. Yet it is his service as an administrator that he is best known for.

Lathrop also helped create one of the most successful and respected junior development programs in the country, through the South Carolina Junior Golf Association (1989) and the South Carolina Junior Golf Foundation (1995). In addition to producing numerous PGA Tour players, those organizations have fostered strong and healthy competition for juniors and awarded more than $300,000 in education scholarships and well over $100,000 to organizations for minority and disadvantaged youth.

For all of the events and organizations Lathrop has had a hand in creating or running, his efforts brokering relationships, sponsorships, and general goodwill for golf in the state are just as far-reaching. He was inducted into the South Carolina Golf Hall of Fame in 1997 and has also been recognized as Father-of-the-Year by the National Father and Son Team Classic tournament in Myrtle Beach .

Happ Lathrop was inducted into the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame in 2008.

Chip was born in Fayetteville , NCin 1956. Following an outstanding high school career at Terry Sanford in Fayetteville , he attended the University of Georgiawhere he was a three-time All-American. He was named the school’s Athlete of the Year as a senior.

Beck won four times on the PGA Tour — 1988 Los Angeles Open and USF&G Classic, 1990 Buick Open, 1992 Freeport-McMoRan Classic — and was runner-up in 20 other events. He was tied for second in the 1986 and 1989 U.S. Opens and was runner-up to Bernhard Langer in the 1993 Masters. He was named to three Ryder Cup Teams (1989-91-93) and played a key role in the U.S.win at Kiawah in 1991’s “War by the Shore.”

Beck became the second player on the PGA Tour to shoot 59 when he accomplished that feat at the Sunrise Golf Club in the 1991 Las Vegas Invitational in a round where he had five pars and 13 birdies, including a three-footer on the final hole. He also became the first player to score a hole-in-one on a par-4 on the Nationwide Tour in the 2003 Omaha Classic. It was only the second par-4 ace scored under the PGA Tour umbrella.

Beck won the Vardon Trophy for low stroke average on the PGA Tour in 1988. He had career earnings of $6,841,741 on the Tour. Today he lives in Chicago , Ill., with his wife Karen, and has played on the Champions Tour since turning 50 in 2006.

Chip Beck was inducted into the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame in 2008.

A Pennsylvania native son of a golf course superintendent, Palmer arrived in North Carolina at what was then Wake Forest College in 1947. From then to 1954, taking several years out for national service, he won two NCAA championships and the very first ACC championship. Today Wake Forest University recognizes Palmer’s contribution with an award in his name to the male student athlete of the year.  

Throughout his life, Palmer has maintained strong ties to Wake Forest, serving on its board of trustees from 1983 to 1986, 1988 to 1991 and 1993 to 1997. He was a tri-chair of the university's Heritage and Promise Capital Campaign, which raised more than $170 million for the university in the early 1990s. He was elected a lifetime trustee of the university in 1997. Palmer endowed Wake Forest with its first golf scholarship in 1960 in honor of his close friend and teammate Marvin "Buddy" Worsham, who died in a car accident in 1950.

Palmer is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, PGA Hall of Fame, American Golf Hall of Fame, the North Carolina Sports Hall of Fame, among others. His 96 professional career titles include 62 on the PGA Tour and 10 on the Champions Tour. He won the Masters four times in 50 appearances, the British Open twice and the U.S. Open once. He finished second three times in the PGA Championship. He captained the victorious 1963 U.S. Ryder Cup team. His victories also include the first PGA Tour event held at Harbour Town Golf Links in Hilton Head, putting the golf course, the tournament and the island on the golfing map. His golf course design business is responsible for more than 300 courses worldwide, including 11 in NC and five in SC.

Arnold Palmer was inducted into the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame in 2007.

A member of the PGA Golf Professional Hall of Fame and a 1995 inductee into the Carolinas PGA Hall of Fame, Gary Schaal, of Murrell’s Inlet, SC has been a leader in South Carolina's golf industry for more than 30 years. In 1973, he completed his tour in the U.S. Air Force, being honorably discharged as captain before becoming an assistant PGA professional at Myrtle Beach National Golf Club. He became a full Carolinas Section PGA member in 1976, and won the section’s PGA Golf Professional of the Year Award in 1985, and the section’s Horton Smith Award in 1978 and 1980.

In 1988, Schaal was elected as national secretary of The PGA of America. Two years later, he would ascend to PGA vice-president and in 1992 became PGA president. During his presidency he was instrumental in launching programs to enhance PGA professional careers through merchandising, employment assessment and lifelong learning programs. He also steered the debut of PGA 2000, which served as the blueprint for The PGA of America’s action plan to lead the association into the new millennium.
 
Schaal was instrumental in founding the Professional Golf Management Program at Coastal Carolina Univeristy, in bringing the Champions Tour to the Dunes Club in Myrtle Beach and in building the TPC at Myrtle Beach. The former head professional at Pine Lakes International is an owner/operator of Deer Track Golf Resort and part owner of Wicked Stick, Indigo Creek and Diamond Back in the Myrtle Beach area. In November last year, Schaal became the 12th person recognized in the "Legends of The PGA" program in a ceremony at Kiawah. Also in 2006 he was named "2006 Father of the Year" by the executive tournament committee of The National Father & Son Team Classic  

Gary Schaal was inducted into the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame in 2007.

Tom Jackson, from Taylors, SC has been actively designing and building golf course since 1965. Prior to starting his own firm in 1971, he worked for two of the country’s leading golf course architects, Robert Trent Jones and George Cobb. During the past 33 years, has been involved with well over 100 golf course projects, the majority being located in the Southeast. These projects include private and semi-private courses, resort courses and public courses, of which seven have been done for various government agencies.
 
His Cliffs at Glassy golf course, north of Greenville, SC opened in 1992 and Golf Digest named the course "Fourth Most Beautiful In The Nation." The Cliffs at Glassy was the first course in the now nationally renowned Cliffs stable that has transformed the Upstate’s reputation as a high-end residential golf haven.

He also designed the course at Prestonwood Country Cub in Cary, NC that hosted the SAS Championship on what was then the Senior Tour. Other notable layouts of his in the Carolinas include Mount Vintage Plantation in North Augusta, rated by the late, great Byron Nelson as a “magnificent layout.”

Tom Jackson was inducted into the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame in 2007.

Don Padgett was hired as Pinehurst Resort director of golf in 1987 by then resort president, Pat Corso, and ClubCorp of America. “We needed a lot of things in that hire,” Corso said many years later. “We needed a mentor for a very young staff and I needed a mentor. That's exactly what we got with Padge.”

Padgett's influence and reputation with the USGA and other national golf organizations enabled Pinehurst to attract professional tournaments once again. The PGA of America staged the Club Professional Championship there in 1988 and the USGA brought the U.S. Women's Amateur the following year. The PGA returned in 1990 and 1991 with staging of The Tour Championship. The USGA returned in 1994 with the U.S. Senior Open and Pinehurst was established as a fitting test for championship golf. The successful staging of the U.S. Men's Open in 1999 and 2005 validated that reputation, along with Padgett's legacy. He was inducted into the Carolinas PGA Hall of Fame in 1998 and named a Living Legend by the PGA of America.

Don Padgett was inducted into the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame in 2006.

Green, regarded as the dean of golf journalism in the Carolinas , covered 75 major golf championships, including 52 Masters. He is the author of four books: From Tobacco Road to Amen Corner: On Sports and Life (1990); Shouting at Amen Corner (1999); Slow Dancing with Bobby Jones (2004); and a History of Charlotte Country Club (2005).

In 2006, Green received the PGA Lifetime Achievement Award in Journalism. He has also won four Golf Writers Association of America awards and is a five-time North Carolina Sportswriter of the Year. Outside golf, he has covered four Olympic Games, 25 Super Bowls, the World Series, U.S. Tennis Opens, one world heavyweight boxing championship between Muhammad Ali and Larry Holmes; and 26 NCAA Final Fours. He retired from daily newspaper reporting in 1999.

Ron Green was inducted into the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame in 2006.

Thompson is the first career superintendent to be elected to the Hall of Fame. He pioneered the use of ryegrass fairway varieties in the Middle Atlantic region, including the Carolinas in the late '60s. A constant ally for turfgrass researchers, he provided “living laboratories” and research support at the Country Club of North Carolina in Pinehurst. In the early ‘90s, his experiments helped identify new bentgrass varieties leading to many of those in use today. He was among the first superintendents to actively promote wildlife habitats on golf courses.

Thompson is a past winner of Distinguished Service Awards from the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America and the Carolinas Golf Course Superintendents Association. In 2002, he received the USGA's highest turfgrass honor – the Green Section Award. Retired as a golf course superintendent, he now instructs aspiring golf course superintendents at Sandhills Community College .

George Thompson was inducted into the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame in 2006

U.S. Open champion 1952, 1963; National PGA champion 1968; National Senior PGA champion 1971, 1977; U.S. Ryder Cup team 1959, 1963, 1965, 1967; National PGA Player of the Year 1952, 1963; winner of 15 PGA Tour events; leading money winner PGA Tour 1952, 1963; PGA Hall of Fame 1974; World Golf Hall of Fame 1982; Connecticut Golf Hall of Fame 1961.

Julius Nicholas Boros was born in Bridgeport , Conn. , March 3, 1920, and without much dispute, he is the best golfer and, when measured against the singular standard of ultimate success in his chosen sport, the greatest athlete ever to have been born in Connecticut .

I t is ironic, however, that if he were to be judged on his golf accomplishments in Connecticut alone, he would not be in the state's Golf Hall of Fame. For although Julius was clearly the odds-on favorite in the Connecticut Amateur and Open championships he entered in 1947, 1948 and 1949, his main competitive years here, he never won either of those state majors. He was a losing semi-finalist to champion Holly Mandly in 1947 and to champion Alpheus Winter Jr. in 1948; and, by the winner's own ready admission, he was an opening match victim of a career round by Pat Mazzarella, the losing finalist, in 1949. Julius was the Amateur's medalist in 1948 and again in 1949. In the Open at Indian Hill he finished at 1-over 289, four behind professional Frank Strazza, and in 1948 at Race Brook he made 6-under 278 for second all alone behind Frank Staszowski's 277.

But despite these disappointments at home, Julius was making some noteworthy moves on the national competitive scene, bearing out what many then believed was his inevitable destination. He led the national qualifying for the 1948 U.S. Amateur with tour-like numbers of 69-66-135, and went on to acquit himself commendably in the championship itself, losing to international-class player Charlie Coe in the 5th round. Then, in November that year, still an amateur, of course, he made a weak 3-over 39 on his final nine in the competitively respected North and South Open PGA Tour stop to finish in a tie for second with Sam Snead, two back of Toney Penna's 3-under 285. This standout performance against the world's best caught the attention of Joe Dey, then secretary of the USGA, and the following spring Julius was being seriously considered for America 's Walker Cup team that would play the British team at Winged Foot August 19-20. Though he wasn't selected, it was this high-level interest and the competitive deeds that had attracted it that confirmed Julius's growing self-conviction about making in on the big tour.

 The clincher for him, however, was a 65 he made at Mid Pines in October to relieve Hogan and Snead of several twenties each. His record in the U.S. Open stands with the best, with the records of Jones, Hogan and Nicklaus. He twice won our national Open, acknowledged by most players to be the most difficult to win of golf's four major championships. And as late as 1973, a 53-year-old Boros was leading the Open at Oakmont with nine holes to play. Battling sudden heavy rain, fierce wind, and Oakmont's brutal length, he slipped to fourth place, a stroke behind Palmer, Nicklaus and Trevino, who were his junior by nine, 20 and 21 years.

His play in the Insurance City-Greater Hartford Open at Wethersfield brought him two seconds and eleven top-ten finishes. In 1979, at 59, he made the 36-hole cut but declined to play. For almost 30 years he returned to Wethersfield to compete as more than just a sentimental favorite, and for more than that time, playing in the ever-capricious public eye perhaps the most temperamentally demanding of games, Julius Boros consistently was a credit to his chosen profession and his home state.

Julius Boros was inducted into the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame in 2003.

Dan was born in Pinehurst, North Carolina in 1947 into a family whose roots in golf course construction reach back into the 19th Century. The Maples family, since Dan’s great-grandfather James, has been involved with golf either as professionals, superintendents, builders or architects.

See the Maples Family Tree for details. At the age of six, Dan designed his first golf course and was handling earth moving equipment before he had his driver's license. During summer vacations Dan worked for his father gaining valuable experience in golf course construction and maintenance.

After receiving a Bachelor's Degree in Landscape Architecture from the University of Georgia in 1972, he worked as a club pro for two years. In 1974 Dan joined the firm of his father, Ellis, as a full partner. Together, the team of Ellis and Dan Maples helped create 17 superb courses including Grandfather Mountain in Linville, NC, and the Country Club of North Carolina Dogwood Course in Pinehurst. Since forming Dan Maples Design, Inc. in 1984, Dan has gone on to become one of the most successful golf course designers in America.

His impressive list of courses includes many of America's finest. Dan is a past president of the American Society of Golf Course Architects. "When you are building a golf course, you have to please three different groups of people; pros, superintendents and owners. Having experience as all three gives me an edge because I know what each is looking for."