A torrent of rain could not dampen the Professional Golfers Association Helping Our Patriots Everywhere (PGA HOPE) and Youth on Course’s emotional second annual Veterans Day collaboration at Corica Park on November 11.
PGA HOPE helps to provide golf lessons to veterans along with opportunities for veterans to connect with each other. Similarly, Youth on Course is a nonprofit designed to help make golf more accessible to all youth.
The golf tournament at the Mif Albright Course, a collaboration known as 4Vets, was meant to connect 18 adolescents from Youth on Course and 18 veterans from the PGA HOPE program, but the weather had other plans.
During the opening ceremonies, it began to rain as our national anthem was played by the Alameda High School String Orchestra. Immediately after the conclusion of the anthem, the orchestra and many event attendees rushed indoors to find shelter for their instruments and bodies. A lone bagpipe performer continued to play through the rain, however, moving some to tears.
The golf tourney in Alameda was ultimately canceled because of the rain, but the event continued, as organizers redirected everyone to an indoor community room where veterans, kids, and parents played ping pong and enjoyed lunch, a hat exchange, and speeches.
The hat exchange is a tradition started at 4Vets, where PGA HOPE veterans and Youth on Course kids gift each other hats from their respective groups.
Many attendees became emotional during various points of the event. Combat veteran and Alameda resident Ramsey Raher, a golf instructor for the PGA HOPE program, was one such person.
“This little kid read a letter to the veterans, and then John (Reissenweber, Northern California PGA HOPE ambassador) read a letter to the juniors, and I was trying to keep tears in,” Raher said. The most important part of the day was that kids and veterans were able to connect with each other. According to Raher, it helped show the younger generation that “there are actually adults, men and women, fighting day and night for our liberties and freedoms.”
Another Alameda veteran, Jo Ann Martinez, who has graduated from the PGA HOPE program twice, said golf is incredibly grounding and therapeutic for her. Martinez served in the U.S. Air Force as a pharmacy tech. She recalled how the Youth on Course child she was paired up with had to correct his letter, which read “Dear Mr. Veteran,” to “Mrs. Veteran” upon meeting her. She was grateful for the tangible learning experience the kids have from engaging with veterans, including recognizing that there are female veterans.
“You have no idea,” she said. “As a woman who served, there are so many times that we’re kind of looked over.”
After proceedings at Corica Park were completed, the same event was repeated at Diablo Creek in Concord in the evening, including closing ceremonies, in order to align with the theme, “Celebrating Our Heroes from Dawn to Dusk.”
The event was organized by PGA Hope, Youth On Course, Kids4Good, and Greenway Golf/Corica Park. The idea originated with Krish Veluthakkal, a 14-year-old from Walnut Creek, who is part of the Youth On Course Program. Veluthakkal explained how he came up with the idea to do a golf tournament with kids from Youth on Course and the PGA HOPE veterans.
“When I talked to PGA HOPE, I learned that some veterans who graduate from the program don’t go out and play on the course,” Veluthakkal said. “I am part of a Youth on Course initiative called DRIVE Club, where we introduce kids new to golf by guiding them during their first rounds. If I could help the kids, I believed I could also help veterans in a similar situation.”
PGA HOPE invited Veluthakkal to speak at one of their graduations, and afterward “some veterans took me up on my offer and I joined them for a few rounds,” he said. “This experience sparked the idea for 4Vets.”
With the help of his father, Mani Veluthakkal, and Reissenweber, they were able to bring this event to fruition.
“The people who work at Youth on Course and PGA HOPE have embraced this, as well as the kids and the veterans. And now they all want to be a part of it because it’s become something special,” Reissenweber said.
PGA HOPE and Youth On Course plan to expand on the idea in the future, including holding another golf tournament for Memorial Day and putting up art displays at future events.
Vicky Nguyen is a contributing writer for the Alameda Post. Contact her via [email protected]. Her writing is collected at AlamedaPost.com/Vicky-Nguyen.
