Dr. David Bruton of Southern Pines, who has served as the chairman of the State Board of Education and a stint as the Secretary of Health and Human Services in Gov. James Hunt’s last term, is taking over the duties of chairman of the Williams tournament committee. Yet, he still sees Adams taking an active part in the running of the tournament.
“Luther Adams has sustained the tournament,” Bruton said, “the first year and every year, including this year. They named me chairman to try and relieve Luther, but he won’t be relieved. Luther is still doing the deal. He is the best scrounge, in a good way, there is. He can get people to donate, participate and help with the deal.”
And what a deal it is.
The tournament, started 12 years ago in memory of the late John Williams, started with the modest goal of raising $75,000 to support scholarships for needy students and seed money to start a stadium fund drive for Pinecrest High School.
Under the watchful eye of Adams, and several other admirers of Williams, the tournament has raised over $400,000 and impacted the Southern Pines community in more than one way.
Bruton points out that the community is the real story of the success of the tournament, and it didn’t hurt that the tournament was established in honor of Williams.
“The community has supported the tournament handsomely from the very beginning,” he said. “The people that donated money in the initial fund-raiser overwhelmed us. We were surprised by the outpouring of love for John Williams.”
This Sunday at Pinehurst Course No. 8, the 12th edition of the memorial tournament takes place. The field was quickly filled, just as in the other 11 editions. And the community support for the tournament is still overwhelming.
“This is not a typical charity tournament,” Bruton said. “Everything we take in goes to the bottom line.”
That is made possible because of the support of people like Floyd Jordan of Jordan Catering. He has been providing a lunch or dinner ever since the tournament started, charging less than his cost to produce the meal.
“Then he comes back and donates money to the Williams Foundation,” Bruton said. “Essentially, he has been giving us a barbecue meal for years.”
Also, area merchants donate items for goody bags, prizes to be used in raffles and awards for the winners.
When the tournament first started it was held at Pine Needles because of the Bell family, Bruton said. Because of having to prepare for the Women’s U.S. Open in 1996, the Pine Needles family asked that the committee start looking for other places to play.
“Bullet and Peggy (Kirk Bell) were really good friends of John Williams,” he said. “We started moving to different courses, including playing back at Mid Pines. But the Bells continued supporting the tournament even when it wasn’t played on one of their courses. They continued to be sponsors and big supporters of the tournament.”
The tournament has been held at various other courses, including the Southern Pines Country Club and Pinewild. This year, Bruton said he called Pat Corso, president of Pinehurst Company, to try to work out a deal to use one of the Pinehurst courses.
“I wanted to get a reasonable deal,” he said. “He said ‘What about No. 8 at no cost?’ I told him I reckoned I better not argue with him about the price.
“Wink Kinney, director of golf at No. 8, has been very helpful. All the courses we’ve used have been so. What is important to know is how wonderful all the golf courses have been and how wonderful all the merchants in the area have been.”
Adams said that the initial fund-raising goal of $75,000 got “done so quickly that it made it much easier to go on. This is what John Williams would have liked. We have lots of needs around here and this has been one way of carrying on his goal of helping the community.
“The players have been faithful and the merchants have been faithful. It’s developed into one of the most anticipated tournaments in the area.”
Legacy
The anticipation and willingness to help falls right into the legacy of Williams, a well-respected member of the community who was cut down in a tragic truck-train collision in 1990. Both Adams and Bruton remember him more for his love for children and the area, as much as for his coaching and teaching endeavors.
“He looked after everybody’s children in a loving and giving way,” Bruton said. “He was just a marvelous man, a prince of a man.”
Adams, as superintendent of Southern Pines schools, brought Williams to Southern Pines in 1960 where he started in the elementary school ranks before working his way up through the system to where he was a coach and athletic director at Pinecrest at the time of his death.
“With the tournament we are trying to carry on the same goals he had as if he were still here,” Adams said, who is retired and lives in Aberdeen.
Those goals, which could best be described as reaching out to the community for support for the children he so dearly loved, worked on two levels – the first was offering children, regardless of circumstances, respect and using outward appearances to reinforce that respect.
“When he was teaching in the elementary school he would hold contests,” Bruton said. “He would make sure that every child received some kind of superlative, made sure that every kid was feeling good about himself. He continued that philosophy as he advanced through the coaching ranks.
“You would see him out mowing the athletic fields in the middle of the night. John felt that if the playing field was in good shape it would make the children feel like the community respected them and, in turn, that would make them have respect for the community.”
Adams said it was not just respect, but an overall attitude that Williams tried to instill in the young people he worked with. He related one of Williams’ favorite sayings: “When God measures a man, he puts the tape around his heart, not his head.”
Not Fade Away
Adams, who is 79, has been the chairman of the Williams golf tournament committee since its inception 12 years ago. Other major participants on the committee and on the Williams Foundation, which administers the funds raised by the tournament, include Tim Maples, Harry Webb, Allan Beck and Billy Strickland, as well as Bruton. Webb is an area businessman, while Maples and Beck are area bankers. Strickland also serves as the chairman of the Williams scholarship committee
And even though he will be stepping back from his duties as chairman, Adams isn’t about to back away from his commitment to the Williams’ legacy.
“It’s more like the committee is trying to look after me,” he said about giving up the chairmanship. “My age is a factor, along with health problems that limit my participation. I felt like it was time to pass it on to younger people. It’s in excellent hands in people like Bruton, Maples, Webb, Beck and Strickland. With people like that involved I’m sure the Williams Foundation will continue on for many years in helping and giving assistance to the community.
“I’ll be there handing out awards Sunday. I’ll have a life-long continued interest in the Foundation, I just won’t be as active with the hands-on details.”
One last little antidote about Adams and his life-long dealings with Williams. The two go way back. In fact, Adams was Williams’ football coach in high school and saw the man rise above his humble beginnings as a child into the man he became. After Williams had graduated from college, Adams decided that he would try to get him to come to Southern Pines.
“When I brought him here in 1960,” Adams said. “I was looking for someone who would do what he ended up doing – work at the elementary school and work his way up through the system. He coached my own son in elementary school. I was trying to find someone I could trust with my own child.
“We were heading back from the beach and I told my wife we need him (Williams) here in Southern Pines. He was fresh out of school and working at Edwards Military Institute (near Salemburg) at the time, so I whipped the car around right in front of a highway patrolman and got a blue light and a ticket at the same time.
“But I went to Williams right then and there and offered him the job. He called the next morning and said he was ready to come – the rest is history.”
It may be history, but it is a living history, and one that adds another chapter Sunday.
