Ann Kay, a former secretary for legendary architect I.M. Pei, wanted her son Stephen to follow in her boss’s footsteps.

He did, in a way.

Stephen Kay is an award-winning golf course architect with his own firm. Along with his partner, Doug Smith, Kay has designed 20 new golf courses and renovated more than 300.

Kay graduated from what he affectionately calls ‘the college with the longest name on earth,’ the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry, in 1974 with a degree in landscape architecture. Now, he is an adjunct professor of turf-grass management at Rutgers University.

Kay would sketch golf course designs in his notebook during classes and had an epiphany after reading an article about golf course architecture.

‘I said a prayer,’ Kay said. ‘I said, ‘God, I want to be a golf course architect.”

He was introduced to golf when he played on his high school golf team in Queens, N.Y. He fell in love with the game and dreamed of going professional some day. Kay left his dream behind after he played a tournament outside of the high school circuit. He realized the players from private clubs were much better than he expected.

He took the idea of building golf courses to his high school counselor, who helped him get in contact with several members of the American Society of Golf Course Architects. The members told him that no colleges offered programs in golf course architecture and advised him to major in civil engineering or landscape architecture.

In 1969, Kay began studying landscape architecture at ESF and joined the freshmen golf team, which was coached by Jim Boeheim.

When the two crossed paths again in the early 1980s at an alumni dinner, Boeheim didn’t remember Kay, and for good reason. At ESF, his name wasn’t Stephen Kay. He was known as Stephen Kachmarchyk.

‘I needed something simpler,’ Kay said. ‘In my 18 years of schooling, only two teachers ever pronounced it right.’

After graduating from ESF, Kay attended Michigan State University at the suggestion of a friend and earned a degree in turf-grass management. He then worked as a golf course superintendent and later collaborated with Bill Newcomb, the first golf course architect to work with renowned designer Pete Dye.

One of Kay’s favorite design projects was The Architects Golf Club in Lopatcong, N.J. When it was finished in 2001, Sports Illustrated ranked the course as one of the ‘Top 10 of 524 New Courses.’ Links Magazine ranked it ‘One of the 10 Best New Courses.’ Golf Digest gave it four and a half stars out of five.

The Lopatcong course is a like a museum of golf course design, Kay said. Each of the 18 holes is modeled in the style of a legendary golf course architect.

He was inspired after hearing about an exhibit showcasing the work of contemporary architects at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City. He originally wanted to see a similar exhibit with golf course architects, but then realized that a museum could not do the designs justice.

‘You can’t really show a golf course in photos,’ Kay said. ‘There are two parts. It’s the design and architectural beauty and then it’s the person playing it.

‘The person being on that particular hole at that particular course and experiencing the challenge and what that challenge does to him.’

Even though he’s gone on to a successful professional career, Kay said he has vivid memories of his time at ESF. He remembers the student strikes of 1970 following the Kent State University shooting. Student protesters shut the campus down for days, and 5,000 students marched to protest in downtown Syracuse, Kay said.

There are also funnier memories. Like the growing popularity of streaking, making him the involuntary spectator of many naked sprints across campus.

Talking about his final days on campus conjured up strong feelings for the otherwise comical Kay. Struggling to hold back tears, Kay recalled going to Marshall Hall after graduation, still in his cap and gown, to get his toolbox from the landscape architecture office.

He remembered on the way out of the building, he began to cry, overwhelmed by the realization of how much fun he had there and how much he would miss it when he left.

jlsiart@syr.edu

Published on October 28, 2009 at 12:00 pm