HOLT LAKE MEMORIES October 22, 2020

Neal Lancaster with Jeff Pope and Berry Skinner
reminisce about his rise as a professional golfer

Gary Ridout has been compiling personal memories for a number of years for a newsletter he produces for present-day Holt Lake residents. We're sharing selected samples from time to time with readers of the Sun. Here are excerpts from Gary's recent conversation with Neal Lancaster, Jeff Pope, and Berry Skinner....

Neal Lancaster: I was born in Smithfield in 1960. I grew up in Smithfield but my family moved to Selma when I was a about eight years old. We were members of the Cardinal Country Club when we lived in Selma. Around age 14, my family moved back to Smithfield and we became members of the Country Club of Johnston County.

Before I talk about my experiences with the game of golf, I would like to say that I grew up loving Holt Lake. When I was 13 in 1975, Berry Skinner’s father, Frank Berry Skinner, got us a boat to drive all over the lake.

My earliest recollection of golf was when my father, Charles Lancaster, and my uncle, Keith Lancaster, would let me ride in the golf cart while they were playing. I would take my toy machine gun and have a great time....

Neal's PGA rookie card

When I was 15 years old, I went out for the Smithfield-Selma Senior High golf team. There were two girls and eight boys on the team. Lynn Mitchiner was one of the girls. She later got her PGA Class A certification and was a club professional at three country clubs up and down the East Coast. She was one of the first women in the nation to gain this certification. She went to the LPGA qualifying school and played Futures Tour for two years.

Lou Ann Johnson went to Duke University and then transferred to Meredith College. While at Meredith, Lou Ann won the NAIA (National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics) national championship. Some of the boys on the team included Carl Welch, Damon Clary, and Mike Jones. Carl Welch was, of course, Bo Welch’s son and was very good at golf. One time at the Country Club he played the front nine holes using only one club: a putter. He broke 40 using that club on the nine holes!

I was not that good on the Smithfield-Selma High team. I would sometimes shoot a 38 on nine holes. In the next few years, I got better and better. My junior and senior years at SSS I went to the state tournaments, but didn’t do worth a darn. Upon graduation, I got no scholarship offers, so I went to work for my father at his used-car lot on Highway 70. The car lot was called J&L Used Cars.

During this time after high school, I started playing more with adults who were very skilled in golf. Jeff Pope, Keith Johnson, and I would play in three-man tournaments on the weekends. We started winning some of these tournaments. Word got out about my success so one day someone from Mount Olive College came to my dad’s car lot and offered me a scholarship. I went to Mount Olive College and stayed about two semesters and then dropped out. College just wasn’t for me. If I had to do it over, I would try harder in college.

I became the assistant pro at Southern Wayne Country Club in Mount Olive. A funny thing about the people at Mount Olive College is that one of the administrators there, Tom Johnson, suspended me for academic reasons. In about two years, we became best buddies playing golf together on the weekends.

I worked at the Southern Wayne Country Club for two years and lived in the Southern Belle motel in Mount Olive. One day the pro at the country club, Rick Atkins, came to me and said: "I think you’ve got some ability, Neal." So in 1988 we raised some money and I went out and played some mini-tour events. I was quite successful, winning the Utah Open and playing well in the California Open. I won the Utah Open by nine shots, which was a tournament record. I beat Jay Don Blake and Keith Clearwater. They told me they were on the PGA tour. I told them it must not be much of a tour if I beat you by nine strokes!

Jeff Pope: At that time I worked at Planters Bank in Smithfield. Before Neal won the Utah Open, he came into the bank. He was driving a worn-out burgundy Ford van and told me he wanted to borrow $2,500. I asked him if he had any collateral. He said he did not. I asked him what the money would be used for. He told me that he and his wife were driving to Utah so he could play in the Utah Open. I asked: “How are you planning to pay the money back?” Neal said: “I plan on winning!”

I thought the world of Neal. We had played in every two-man tournament around. I told him to give me the title to the burgundy van. I never put a lien on the van. I just held the title in the drawer in my office. Neal ended up winning that tournament and won $25,000. First thing he did was come to the bank and pay off his $2,500 loan.

Neal: The Utah Open was sponsored by Chevrolet and I tried to sell them my old Ford van and fly home. The Chevrolet people refused! Overall, I played in 16 tournaments and won $89,000. The funny thing is that when you won a tournament, they gave you a three-by-eight-foot check, just like in the movie ”Happy Gilmore” with Adam Sandler! I went to tour school that year and got my PGA Tour Card. At that time, only 125 golfers in the United States had a PGA Tour Card.

Shortly after I got my card in 1990, about 15 members of the Country Club of Johnston County organized a sponsorship to finance my travels on the PGA tour. That first year I lost my card because I was ranked 136th. I had to go back to tour school and then got my card back. At that point, I realized it was time for me to go on my own and become a real golf professional. I became my biggest motivator because I felt like I had the ability and could do it. I knew that a lot of people in Smithfield also believed in me.

I kept my PGA Tour Card for the next 17 years. I did well enough to make a very good living. The PGA retirement package is so good. I didn’t care about winning tournaments as much as I wanted to make retirement points. Whenever you made the cut in a tournament, you were awarded retirement points.

Neal at the Byron Nelson Classic, 1994

One of the first PGA tournaments I played in was the GGO (Greater Greensboro Open). I was very nervous. Jeff Pope was my caddy. On the first tee, I topped the ball! Everybody was looking at me, scratching their heads.

When we got to the 18th hole, I saw that it was a dog-leg-left par five. I hooked the ball and it went into an adjoining fairway. I went over to the ball and I saw that I would have to go through the woods and over a sand trap. I looked at Jeff and asked: "What is the distance to the sand trap?” Jeff looked at me and said: “I don’t know!” I said to Jeff: “What do you mean, you don’t know? A good caddy would have the yardage to the sand trap!” Jeff said: “A good golfer would not be where you are!” I was happy because this was not on TV, but everybody around us fell down laughing! I did look down at my ball and realized he had a point. I missed the cut on that tournament by a mile.

Jeff: I would like to say that I appreciate Neal letting me caddy. There are a lot of people with more caddy experience than me. After we got started Neal said: “I’ll keep the yardage. You just carry the bag.” Later, as we approached one green, Neal asked: “Jeff, what is the yardage to the green?” I went to a sprinkler head and told him it was 138 yards, thinking to myself that It really didn’t matter because he was so far off the pace of the leaders. Neal approached the ball and sailed it over the green and into the back rough. He then looked at me and walked off the distance to the green. When he got to the hole, he yelled back at me, “it’s one-hundred-thirty-nine yards, not one-thirty-eight!” I yelled back: "You just hit it one-hundred-forty-five, so what difference does it make?”

Berry Skinner: When I came back from school at UNC-W, I worked at First Citizens Bank. I was repossessing cars for the bank. After a while, I started working with my dad at Skinner Insurance. One day, Neal said: “I want you to come and caddy for me.” I said: “Oh Lord!” Over the years, I have caddied for Neal all over the nation. I have been to New York, Greensboro, Atlanta, Las Vegas, Arizona, Louisiana, Florida, and many other places. Neal never let me pay for anything. The last time I caddied was at Pebble Beach in California. Neal shot a 71.

Neal with caddy Barry Skinner

We had a great time and met a lot of people. I really enjoyed meeting Jordan Speith. I remember watching Freddie Couples play. I saw Justin Rose, and standing right next to him was Justin Timberlake. I was staring at them when Neal came up to me and said: "Act normal, just act normal!”

I will say that being a caddy is a very hard job. You have to carry a 50-pound golf bag. Caddying for Neal Lancaster is an even harder job. He can’t keep up with anything. You got to have cigarettes, tees, a pencil, and a lot of other things he needs. One time he told me he would be keeping up with the yardage so he kept the yardage book. He didn’t know it, but I got a yardage book for myself. About the third hole, he hit a bad shot and tore the book up. I will say, though, that Neal is still very talented in golf.

Neal: You meet a lot of people playing professional golf. As a rookie, I was playing in the Players Championship in Jacksonville, Florida. As I was waiting to tee off, I realized I was standing next to Jack Nicklaus. He looked at me and said: “Good morning, Neal!” I said to myself: “I didn’t know he even knew my name!” I looked back at him and said: “Good morning Mr. Nicklaus!” That day I shot a 71. I think it was because Jack Nicklaus knew my name. That made a difference to me.

One day we were playing in Hartford, Connecticut and I was with a group of golfers. They were saying “Next week the King is coming, the King is coming!” I was just listening and thinking. Finally I said: “the King’s coming? When is Richard Petty gonna get here?” They said: “No, Arnold Palmer!” I said: “Well, where we live there is only one King, and that is #43 Richard Petty from Randleman, North Carolina!”

Berry: At one tournament when I was caddying for Neal, we were making the turn at number 9. I looked up at the scoreboard and noticed Neal was the leader. I said: "Look, Neal, you are in the lead!” He bogeyed the next two holes and said: “Son of a gun, my caddy has gone and made me nervous!”

Neal: The game is very different now from when I started on the tour. Back then, we would all go out to eat. Everybody hung out together and had a cocktail. Now each player has a trainer, a cook, and a masseuse and they keep to themselves. The money has gotten much bigger also. When I won the Byron Nelson Tournament in 1994, first place was $215,000. Now first place is $1.2 million.

Jeff: I wanted to say something about Bo Welch, the former golf pro and manager here at the Country Club of Johnston County. I was invited to play golf in a foursome. I had just joined the club and did not know that many people, but when I got to the tee, I realized that there were already four people there. The host had mistakenly asked another person to play.

Bo Welch was sitting on the front porch of the pro shop watching everyone tee off. I think he realized I was embarrassed at not going to be able to play so he came over and introduced himself. He asked: "Do you play golf?” I said: “Yeah, I’ve been playing about a year.” He asked: "What do you shoot?" I said: “About 80.” He said: "Hang out for a few minutes and let me watch you putt down at the putting green.” In a few minutes, he said: “Let’s go over to the driving range.” He brought a bucket of range balls and watched me hit. Back then, I could hit them a long way. I asked him: "How much do I owe you for the balls?” He said: "Nothing, these are my balls.” He said: "You can come out here anytime you want and hit balls on the driving ranges for free. They are my balls. In six months, you will be beating everyone.” Bo Welch cared about this golf course, the club, and the golfers.

Berry: I just remember Bo Welch was always working on the golf course. You could ride by at night and Bo would be out on the golf course running the sprinklers to keep the golf course up.

Neal: A lot of people don’t realize that Bo Welch was one of the best golfers in the state when he was younger. He would play with Ray Floyd’s father and when Ray Floyd got a little older, Bo helped coach him.

One day, I was on the driving range and I saw all these golfers lining their clubs up in the front of them when they were hitting the balls. I was 16 at the time. Bo was in the pro shop, so I went in and asked him if he could help me line up my shots. He came out and said: "Well, where are you going to hit it?” I said: “I am going to hit it right at that tree.” Bo said: "OK, hit it.” I hit the ball and it landed directly in front the tree. Bo scratched his head and said: “I don’t know why you think you need help lining up; it went right where you wanted. All I can say, Neal, is that if you think you’re gonna hit it there, you will hit it there. If you don’t think you will hit it there, you won’t.”

Because of what Bo said, I have never lined up in my life. The whole game is mental. I play by feel.

Berry: One of the sports magazines in the mid-1990s had an article about Neal. The article stated that Neal Lancaster was one of the best athletes on the PGA tour. Not only was he a good golfer, but he was the most athletic of all the golfers....

Neal: I have gotten to know a lot of famous golfers over the years. Every year I get a Christmas card from Jack Nicklaus. I played with Jack Nicklaus at the Memorial Gold Tournament in Columbus, Ohio. He was one of the nicest people I have ever known.

Neal playing at Hilton Head, 2015

I played with Tiger Woods four times on Saturdays of different tournaments and beat him all four rounds that I played with him. Each time I teed off with him, he won that tournament the next day. One time when we were playing together, the crowds were huge. I said: "Tiger, look at these people wanting to watch you play!” He said: “I thought they were here to see you, Cuz!” My nickname in the tournaments was “Cuz.” I had “Cuz” printed on my hats.

I played the U.S. Open In 1995 and 1996. I shot 29s both years. That was a 108-year record that had never been broken. In 1996, my father, Charlie Woodall, Jim Jones, and three other men came to watch me. I was doing terrible after the first 27 holes, so they left. They stopped at a gas station and saw my picture come up on the TV set in the gas station. The sound on the TV set was off. They said: "Oh no, what did he do now?” Then someone called them and said: “Neal has set another record and shot a 29 again.” Golf Digest came out with an article entitled the “Top Ten Bonehead moves of the year.” Those six men leaving the U.S. Open and not seeing me set a record made number one in the top ten.

Jeff: Neal Lancaster has done quite a bit for the betterment of the community. For instance, he was gracious enough to allow Johnston Community College to use his name and celebrity status for their golf tournaments beginning 26 years ago. These golf tournaments have raised close to 1.5-million dollars for scholarships at Johnston Community College.

Neal: The game of golf is a perfect game played by imperfect people. I love golf because you are outdoors with the singing birds and the beautiful trees. I have been very fortunate to play golf with some of the greatest golfers in the world. I have been fortunate that the Country Club of Johnston County and the people of the town of Smithfield have backed me. Most of all, I have been fortunate to have made good friends along the way.

Previous installments in this series may be viewed with these links:
2-28-19 / 3-28-19 / 4-25-19 / 7-11-19 / 8-8-19 / 9-12-19> 1-2-20>

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