Gary Reynolds represents the best of the golf club professional. He spent his career, including 27 years at Hartford Golf Club, giving back to the game he loves. With his wife Mim working in the golf shop while he was outside giving lessons, running tournaments or the club’s outstanding caddie program, he became a respected institution at HGC. Reynolds, who retired in 2008, joins the 2011 class of inductees to the Connecticut Golf Hall of Fame.
He may be best known outside his club as the co-founder, with fellow Hall of Famer Frank Selva, of the Connecticut Section PGA Golf Foundation. He was also instrumental in the formation of The First Tee of Connecticut.
He also gained notice by raising more than $310,00 over the years for the Section Golf Foundation. Much of the funds came from his marathon golf day when he would play as many holes as daylight would permit. He collected pledges for each hole played and each birdie made.
“After a while we got it down to a science,” Reynolds said. “We’d jump out of the cart, hit the shot and get back in the cart. In 15 hours and 45 minutes of daylight, we played 328 holes. We raised between $25,000 and $30,000 in each of the last five years.”
Reynolds has served on the CT Section Board of Directors since 1985, was vice president from 1989-92 and president from 1993-94, and has served on or been chairman of various committees. He has been on the Board of Directors of The First Tee of Connecticut since its inception as The First Tee of Hartford in 1999.
He was awarded the Section’s Presidents Award in 2005, the Bill Strausburg Award three straight years 1996-1998, the Merchandiser of the Year Award in 1995, and the Golf Professional of the Year honor in 1989. He was a member of the inaugural class of inductees in the Connecticut Section PGA Hall of Fame.
Reynolds has served the PGA of America as a District Director and worked on the National PGA Golf Day Committee. He was twice a finalist for the National Golf Professional of the Year Award.
Growing up in an upstate New York town that didn’t have a golf course until he was a junior in high school, Reynolds got a late start in the game. He captained the St. Lawrence University golf team before becoming a golf professional at two Massachusetts clubs. He was an assistant at Longmeadow CC and head professional at Pittsfield CC before joining the Hartford GC in 1981.
“The most fun thing, and the thing I’m most proud of, was the hundreds of young people that I was able to touch over the years,” Reynolds said. “A kid might come to work for you in the bag room and stay with you for a couple of years, then become a PGA professional or a lawyer or a businessman. Some of those relationships never end.”
Reynolds still remembers picking up Golf Magazine in 1999 and reading an article about the PGA’s First Tee program.
“I thought, this is what golf should be all about, what we in golf should strive for,” he said.
And that he did. Working with Ted May, Kent Scully, Skip Gengras and others, they founded The First Tee of Hartford. He was supportive of the Connecticut Golf Foundation, a parallel program run with support from the CSGA.
“Our assistant pros were giving lessons for that program, so it was natural to merge the operations into The First Tee of Connecticut,” Reynolds said.
“Golf has meant everything to me,” he said. “The integrity of the people who play it, the enduring relationships you develop. Like baseball, golf doesn’t really change. And thank goodness for that. The foundation of the game, the etiquette, the meaning of the game and what those who play get from it never change.”
