The tireless pursuit of perfect turf

Green Oaks Golf Club

COLUMBUS, Miss.

Spend just a few minutes with Wayne Box and you begin to believe he can solve almost anything.

When he took up golf in his mid-30s, he was a single-digit player within a couple of years. And when he left the construction industry with designs on becoming a golf course superintendent, he learned on the job while completing studies to earn a turfgrass science degree from Mississippi State University well into his 40s.

It should come as no surprise that when Box, 57, returned seven years ago to Green Oaks Golf Club as superintendent after an eight-year hiatus, he made short order of turning around the layout that had been neglected since his departure. The changes include adding lakes, tees, greens, drainage and cart paths, and removing several trees. In fact, the greens were in such bad shape when he returned to the course in 2000, he said, that six temporary greens were in use. Today the Bermuda surfaces thrive.

“With no budget to speak of, Box has transformed this former dog track into a golf course that is rapidly developing into something that members can be proud of and enjoy playing,” wrote former general manager Brent Johannsen in nominating Box for Superintendent of the Year.
“Wayne is a tireless worker who deserves better compensation than Green Oaks can presently provide him.” In a nutshell, that’s what you get with Box – a lot for a little. “He seems to be tireless in his devotion to the course,” said Carl Lisowski, a member of the club’s board of directors. “It’s an aspect of his personality that I admire.

“He’s the best thing that ever happened to Green Oaks.” For example, Box installed new cart paths in 2006, removed trees and completed 4,000 yards of drainage ditches that divert rain off the course.

With little money at his disposal, Box called on his experiences in construction and as the former owner of a septic tank company and his local connections. He borrowed a backhoe and bulldozer from a local contractor and dug drainage ditches around the course, including in wooded and out-of-play areas. He also enlarged a pond, to where it now is large enough to support marine life, and built another 3-acre empoundment by the 14th fairway. That pond not only collects irrigation water, but helped frame two holes on the course as well.

This work came on top of redesigning and enlarging several greens and rebuilding two others to USGA specifications for a few thousand dollars, he said.

Then there’s the tree removal. Long ago, hundreds of pines were planted on the course, and eventually many became problematic, choking out air circulation on greens and fairways and interfering with play. Many also were damaged during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. During the past few years, Box and his crew of four have removed hundreds of trees, mostly pines and a few sweet gum.

After all, as Box said: “It’s not called Green Pines, it’s Green Oaks Golf Club.” What maintenance equipment the course had when Box arrived in 2000, including the new stuff, was in shambles. Box fixed what was there and began adding pieces through lease programs and clever buying decisions. For example, last year he bought an out-of-use 80-inch Soil Reliever from a course in Tennessee for $2,200, fixed it and says it now is worth about $25,000. More than that, he now doesn’t have to pay an outside contractor $2,000 a shot to aerate his greens, and he can do it more often.

“He made it look like new,” said Jacob Everett Gable, Box’s assistant and a senior at Mississippi State. “It will save the course thousands of dollars.” His dedication is not limited to golf course conditioning.

Box now teaches junior clinics at the course and collects donated clubs for children who otherwise would have none. He has worked to develop an annual fundraiser tournament to benefit local junior golf. He also teaches adults throughout the summer. He is so highly regarded at the club that he was permitted to play in the 2006 Club Championship. He won.

There’s a sad side to Box’s story as well. Box’s hectic schedule has been, in a way, his salvation.

Box and his wife, Virginia Maxey Box, lost both their children in automobile crashes involving drunk drivers. Stephen Wayne Box was 17 when he was killed in 1988, and Melissa Ann Box died in 1993 at age 21. Separately, each will tell you that the losses are difficult for the other to talk about it.

“We never wanted anyone to feel sorry for us,” Wayne said.

Afterward, Box sank himself into his work like never before, and it has been that way ever since. It was Virginia who encouraged him five years after the death of their daughter to get back to playing golf. And because he spent so much time at the course, she joined his crew five years ago.

“A lot of people say they can’t work with their husbands,” she said. “But I enjoy it.”

– Mike Bailey