ATHABASCA — Built into the side of the valley, the Athabasca Golf and Country Club has a reputation as a particularly beautiful course — the grass IS greener on the other side of the river, but that has as much to do with Hugh Greene as it does with Mother Nature.
There's a lot that goes into turf care management at a popular golf course. Keeping the greens and fairway trimmed to certain standards and conditions is just one aspect of the job Greene does so well, and after 37 years — 31 of them in Athabasca — it's a job he still enjoys every day. It wasn't until this year though he was recognized by the Alberta Golf Superintendents Association with the Walter Gooder Distinguished Service Award after he was nominated by a former protégé.
“I came here, fell in love with the property and the town and never left,” Greene said Dec. 8.
His nominator has a local connection as well. Dean Zilinski is from Boyle and worked for Greene before becoming superintendent at another golf course.
“Anyone can be nominated and that's presented to the board of directors of the AGSA, and they take the nominations and make a decision,” he said. “It’s not based on the course so much as it is the person.”
And he had no idea he was going to be handed the award at the AGSA meeting in Canmore Nov. 22; not even realizing it when Zilinski got up to make the preamble speech, as his longtime friend is also the outgoing past-president of the association.
"He got up and started doing a spiel – he's the outgoing past-president of the association. I'm very proud of what he's done going back to the days when he was a young fellow starting out and working for me,” said Greene. “So, he started his little spiel and said a couple things and didn't get into Athabasca or my name until a little further and then you could have knocked me over with a feather when I put two and two together and figured out it was me.”
The distinguished service award was started in 2000 and named for Gooder in 2017, who was one of the founding superintendents of the AGSA in 1986. Gooder himself won the honour in 2006.
“I'm very honoured and humbled,” said Greene. “It's the pinnacle of what you can achieve provincially so I was quite honoured and humbled to receive that.”
Greene oversees a staff of 10 to 12 and enjoys the variety the job has to offer as well as the amazing vistas he is privileged to see every day.
“I hosted an association meeting a couple years ago and we had 40 or 50 guys from around the province and some of the guys that have never been here before were just blown away by what we have in our little town,” he said. “People we get out that haven't been here before that play a lot of golf, as soon as they take a look at the place they're usually wowed, and they'll be back.”
Greg Aasen is the interim president of the golf course and said he couldn’t be prouder of Green.
“On behalf of the membership I would like to congratulate Hugh on the prestigious award he received and his many years of service,” said Aasen. “He has continuously kept our course in meticulous shape and every season we receive comments from visitors on what a great course we have here."
