Growing up in Ambler, Montgomery County, Pa. under a very strict household, I found alternative comfort and peace spending most of my time at the Sandy Run Country Club where I caddied, cleaned golf clubs, chased after balls, learning about golf and working in the pro-shop. The head pro, Jock MacKenzie and his wife were like parents to me. Jock paid me for tending to golfer’s golf clubs and his wife would bring me lunch and dinner. Jock taught me about golf, and how to swing a golf club when I was 9-years old.
At age 11, I came in 3rd at a caddy tournament at Aronomick CC in Newtown Square, with a score of 88. At age 12, I came in second at a caddy tournament Melrose CC in Philadelphia with a 79. I always credited that score to an old friend Dinny Grasso who caddied for me.
At age 14, I learned how to give group golf lessons to beginning golfers. I played on the various USAF base teams in Japan, California and Michigan. I knew that someday, somehow I would own a golf course. I also learned that I could never afford a regulation 18-hole golf course so I looked at open land and farms for sale that were either too run down or too expensive. I saw a advertisement for the sale of a small golf course near Cook Forest in the Pittsburgh Newspaper in 2004. I bought and changed the name from Laurel Run Golf Course to Sigel Golf Course and later to its present name Sigel the “Unsnobby” Golf Course.
Business was good but the golf course was poorly designed with tiny greens serving multiple holes, wasted land, unchallenging holes and random t-boxes.
I purchased large mowers, a bull dozer, excavator, tractors, aeration machine, core harvester and other equipment. I continue to redesign the Sigel Golf Course to the present day.