Bill Dober, Dr. Bob Ruby’s longtime friend and golfing partner, remembers the 2009 conversation still.
“I said, ‘You were going to take that rules test. Did you take it?’
He said, ‘I did.’
I said, ‘Well, how did you do?’
And he said, ‘I did pretty well.’
‘Don’t give me pretty well,’ I said. ‘It’s like a round of golf. I want a number. What was your number?’
And he says, ‘I aced it.’
‘What do you mean you aced it?,’ I said. ‘What was the number?’”
Finally, Dober got his answer. “‘I got a 100,’ he told me.”
It’s the first thing you hear about Dr. Bob Ruby if you haven’t been playing against him or met him officiating at an event. He aced the rules test. But you soon learn that this rare feat is only one of the West Haven dentist’s many achievements in 50 years of devotion to the game—as a player, a volunteer, and an official.
And chances are you will have to pry it out of him.
He is, for example, one of the only golfers ever to win the Connecticut Father Son championship with both his father, Robert J., Sr., and his son, Brendan. And he did it 35 years apart—in 1976 and 2012.
He’s an accomplished player. From the time he finished runner-up in the Connecticut Junior Amateur in 1965 at 17 to the time, forty years later when he and partner Dober finished second in the Senior Division of the Anderson Four-Ball at Winged Foot, losing in a playoff. “That one still stings,” he says.
“He is a gentlemen and may strike you as pretty mild-mannered,” says Dober. “But Bob is incredibly competitive. I can’t think of anybody who wants to win more than him.” And win he has.
He owns 12 club championships spread between four clubs including Madison, where he’s also been Senior Club Champion 10 times. He was a semi-finalist in the 2001 Connecticut Amateur—at the age of 53.
Ruby also captained the amateur side of the Julius Boros Challenge Cup in 2013 and 2014 as well as the state’s Tri-State team in those years.
But it is in thousands of hours of giving back to the game, especially as a rules volunteer at the state and national level, that Bob Ruby has made an indelible mark. An official for 18 years with the CSGA, he has also been called to officiate at five U.S. Open championships, three U. S. Amateur championships, 11 U.S. Senior Open championships and the Walker Cup. He sits on the USGA Senior Amateur Championship Committee. “Bob has given very unselfishly of himself to help make a game he loves better,” says Jeff Hall, USGA Managing Director of Rules and Open Competitions “and across a variety of championships, to provide players an exemplary experience. And he has done this while being a wonderful husband, father, brother and professional. I’m both fortunate and proud to call Doctor Bob ‘friend.’”
With his wife Maureen, he has raised four children—Brendan, Rob, Kelly and Jyl—with the help of a successful dental practice. He was, he says, speechless when he heard of his induction into the Connecticut Hall of Fame. “It’s in my nature to give back and I have the support of my family to do that,” says Dr. Bob. “I love this game, partly because it’s so difficult, so fleeting. I’m deeply honored.”