My father tucked away an aged clipping of a golfing moment to remember. He had a hole-in-one at Lyndon Golf Course. If memory serves, he hit the thrilling shot back in the 1960's. As a little boy I remember being impressed. It is my first recollection of Lyndon Golf Course in Fayetteville.
These days I drive by it a couple of times a day on my way to and from work. On occassion I have played the course this short, but enjoyable executive course. The 71 acres of land bump up next to Route 5 and straddle Route 92. It is a large piece of open space in an area where real estate can sell for a premium.
That is why the "Syracuse Realty Group" sign caught my eye when I passed the course this afternoon. I noticed the modest and aging clubhouse was vacant. Just a few weeks away from the spring golf season I wondered if the property was being sold.
Could this be the end of a one of the oldest golf courses in our area? Lyndon dates back to 1920. Its first holes were once part of the even older Onondaga Country Club dating back more than a century when today's suburbs where truly the country.
I contacted a representative of Syracuse Realty Group. He reassured me the property was not for sale. A trust in the name of E. I. White owns the property. The convenant attached to the trust mandates the property continue as a golf course. That language prohibits a speculator from sweeping in to put an end to birdies and bogies and build lucrative housing units.
It turns out, longtime operator Nick Capozzi is hanging up the golf spikes. That has left the trust without a course operator. The real estate people are tasked with finding someone who will lease the course and run it.
In a golf community highly saturated with courses finding an operator before golfers want to put the first tee in the ground at Lyndon may be just as tough as getting that once in a lifetime hole-in-one.
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