The golf world lost one of the greats last weekend. By great, I am not talking about fame or talent, but simply love of the game. He wasn’t very fond of the rules though, because he pretty much made his own. I am referring to my old man, Tom Knick. He lost his battle to cancer last Saturday, 1/3/2026. He battled several rounds of lung cancer over the years, but this time it spread and took him out at the age of 81.

I remember following my dad and grandpa around Penn Terra GC as a young lad. Dad would let me hit my own ball, but would often pick it up and take it to where his ball was. He HATED slow play. He would get aggravated with his golf league partner for the last decade or so because he would clean his club after a shot before putting it back in his bag. Dad thought this took too much time. Patience was not one of his virtues.

After retiring from GM in his early 50s, dad worked and played golf at Beechwood GC in Arcanum, OH almost exclusively. He was already retired at the age I am now. He also worked at the local hardware store in the winter. As I already mentioned, he played the game the way he thought it should be played.

The last time I played with dad, my son was playing with us. Dad’s eyes were getting pretty bad. He would hit one down the middle of the fairway and think it was a bad shot. He would be pleasantly surprised when we showed him where his ball ended up. You can still enjoy a good shot even when you can’t see it I guess.

My mom tasked me with going through his golf stuff. He had an old golf bag full of every club he ever owned up in their attic. It also had ancient golf balls in it. Memories came rushing back when I saw his old McGregor woods and irons, the clubs I used to take over to our community park during summer break and spent hours hitting balls back and forth. This is where I learned bad habits that inflict my swing to this very day. I loved it though. I don’t like to keep things for the sake of keeping things, but I just may need to hang on to these. Also in dad’s golf stash, I also found dozens of ball markers and probably 200 tees. In even found 2 metal golden tees. I doubt they’re real gold, I will keep one and give my son the other. Fools gold. In dad’s golf bag were his old Ping Zing 1 and 3 woods. He played these for many years. I think I will need to hang on to these as well.

Golf is full of memories. If you still have your dad, uncle, best friend from high school or work that you played with over the years, take whatever opportunity you can find to play with them when it warms back up. You never know. It might be the last time.