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(mainlinetoday.com)
For the better part of a year, a huge digital clock in the maintenance office at Merion Golf Club has been counting down the seconds to the 2013 U.S. Open. The Ardmore institution will host the event June 10-16. The club welcomed its last Open 32 years ago.
It’s a perfect time, then, to pay homage to the first family of turf—at least, as far as Merion goes. Well, beyond Merion, really.
Tom Valentine is the middle son of Richie Valentine and the grandson of Joseph Valentine. Both were course superintendents at Merion—Joseph until his retirement in 1962, then Richie, who retired in 1989, eight years after Merion’s last U.S. Open. During the Valentines’ 72-year run, Merion hosted 13 major golf-tour events, including five U.S. Amateurs, four U.S. Opens and two U.S. Women’s Amateurs.
“The legacy of this family is like no other golf course in the world in duration,” says John Capers, who is Merion’s archivist and historian, among other club responsibilities.
Now 48, Tom Valentine lives in Malvern. He and his older brother, Rich, and youngest brother, John, grew up working at Merion. They called it “the farm.” Since then, Tom has spent 20 years working in the sales end of the turf industry. For the past decade, he’s led the sales force at SynaTek, a manufacturer/distributor of liquid and granular plant fertility products. He helped introduce new technologies into the golf market—like fertigation and water-quality injections. One of his major clients—no surprise—is Merion.
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