ROWLEY – Rowley Country Club inducted champion senior golfer Bill Boylan and former owners Ralph DiGiorgio and Tom O’Connell into its Hall of Fame during a start-of-summer season community open house on Sunday.
The Rev. Dr. Boylan, pastor emeritus at Byfield Parish Church, has been playing at Rowley for most of the club’s 61 years. At the age of 86, he still tees it up regularly at the Club’s Wednesday morning scramble and has two RCC holes-in-one to his credit. Boylan also has an impressive senior record, having accumulated multiple Top 5 finishes at the Senior Games in New England and on the national stage in Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Minneapolis, and Fort Lauderdale.
Former owners DiGiorgio and O’Connell were inducted together “because it was their joint vision that allows us to be standing here today,” General Manager Darin Chin-Aleong told the crowd.
In 2013, they purchased Rowley Country Club and went on to build the Residences at Rowley Country Club. They also focused on the resurrection of the golf course and hired superintendent Zack Lamkin and gave him the resources needed to make Rowley Country Club what it is today, Chin-Aleong said.
The three new members join inaugural inductees Tammy White, a member since the 1980s and several time Ladies Club Champion, and Mike Fecteau, former general manager and many-time club champion, who were announced during the club’s 60th anniversary celebration last year.
The Sunday event also recognized junior member Tyler Chin-Aleong, who earned an invitation to the Future Masters in Dothan, Alabama beginning June 24. The tournament, in its 77th year, has become a proving ground for golf’s brightest junior stars, including Scottie Scheffler and several U.S. Open, Masters and PGA Championship winners.
Ted Speros, owner of Rowley Farms, which includes the golf course, welcomed those gathered Sunday and said while we celebrate the nation’s 250th and the great history of Rowley Country Club, we also look to the future with plans to expand the course and build out a Live, Work, Play and Celebrate-style multiuse development.
Susan Hazen, the president of the Rowley Historical Society, was a featured guest and shared a bit of Rowley history with attendees, including the storied rivalry between Rowley and Georgetown over which town actually has claim to Old Nancy, the historic cannon. ♦
