A few years ago, I was playing a round of golf at the famous TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra, Florida. My father, though retired, works there a few days a week helping with PR as a storyteller, and is good friends with the management and staff.
This particular day on the stadium course was memorable for two reasons. First, I made par on infamous number 17—long a nemesis to many a pro and duffer. I really should have retired my clubs right then.
The other interesting thing that day is that former president Bill Clinton was playing the same course at the same time along with Phil Mickelson. Of course, there were several Secret Service agents on site—part of Mr. Clinton’s detail. I struck up a conversation with one of them in the clubhouse. He had been looking at the various framed photographs on the walls, famous moments in the fabled history of the venue.
Because I am the senior minister at a church in the Washington, DC area, I have worked closely with many current and retired members of the Secret Service—so I dropped a few names and we talked for a bit.
That’s when I got the idea to write my second “Templeton Davis” story (the first one being, “CAMELOT’S COUSIN”) to begin with a daring attack on a former president on a golf course. But because my father is still affiliated with the TPC Sawgrass, I opted for another famous spot—the beautiful Greenbrier Resort in West Virginia.
I actually ran my idea by a couple of my “connections” in presidential security. One of them told me: “After reading your story, I don’t think I’ll ever think the same way about being on a golf course.”