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One Eye, once more: Final Clody’s scramble set Sept. 9
After 25 years and nearly $200,000 in fundraising, a unique Putnam County tradition is coming to an end.
Clody’s One Eye, still touting itself as the world’s only one-eye golf tournament, is set for one last round on Saturday, Sept. 9 at Old Hickory Golf Course.
For the final go-round, organizers are planning a single flight set for 11 a.m.
“This is gonna be the final — 25 years,” organizer and tournament namesake Terry “Clody” Clodfelter told the Banner Graphic recently.
The rules are straightforward: A four-man best-ball scramble with one mulligan per player available for $5 per person.
The cost is $200 per four-man team. First prize is $300, followed by $200 for second and $100 for third.
The tournament will be followed by a 5 p.m. reception at Greencastle Elks Lodge 1077, 202 S. Indiana St.
All proceeds go to the Riley Children’s Hospital opthalmology department. Through the 2016 scramble, $182,000 has been donated by Clody’s One Eye so far.
Oh yes, and there is the little matter of those pesky, little eye patches that make golf so much more challenging.
For a quarter century now, those patches have been teaching otherwise competent golfers how difficult the game can be without depth perception.
It was a lesson that Clody’s friends needed 25 years ago when they couldn’t stop razzing him for his golfing skills.
When Clody, who has no sight in one eye following a childhood accident, challenged these friends to try golfing with just one eye, a tradition was born.
One of the participants — who shall remain nameless — borrowed the original set of eye patches from the infirmary at the Putnamville State Farm.
Then, as now, even Clody donned an eye patch, noting that the discomfort of the patch is itself a handicap to comfortably playing the game.
“Eight of us started it,” Clody noted recently. “Threw money in the hat, winner takes all. Five buck winner, five buck loser.”
It took a few years for the fundraising for Riley to start. The first three years were for “sh**s and grins,” as Clody puts it.
During the third year, Tony Sparks said to Clody, “You ought to do this for charity.”
And so Clody reached out to Dr. Eugene Helveston, who had performed his surgery back in 1972, and the partnership between Clody’s One Eye and Riley was born.
“Dr. Helveston was the surgeon performing in 1972,” Clody said. “Between the two of us, we got this all started. He was on the ground floor of the One Eye and he’s coming back this year.”
Now into his 80s, Helveston has not been at the tournament in several years, so his former patient will be glad to see him.
“I’m glad he’s coming,” Clody said. “I’ve had a lot of conversations with that man over the years.
“It’ll probably be an emotional, humbling day.”
Their 45-year relationship began with a freak accident by a 13-year-old boy. Clody was cutting down a thorn tree and got a thorn in his eye.
Five days later he suffered a cataract.
Five or six months later, his retina detached.
Dr. Helveston performed the surgery that kept Clody from further injury, but he has had no sight in the eye since he was 14.
Clody noted how much has changed since his own accident and surgery.
“I think I was there at Riley for six or eight days after the retina surgery,” he said. “Now they do the retina surgery and send you home that afternoon.”
While the general advancement of medicine is certainly a part of such positive changes, Clody’s own tournament has helped Riley keep up with those changes.
“They have opened their own digital diagnosis eye laboratory with the funds that we produced for them,” Clody said.
Here in Putnam County, the funds have also provided juvenile vision screening kits to local schools and even funded eye surgeries for kids in Putnam and Clay counties.
“We’ve taken care of 10 or 12 kids over the years in unfortunate situations,” Clody said. “The families would get ahold of me and I’d contact Riley. It would take care of 100 percent of the cost.”
Even as the tournament’s run winds to a close, the Riley connection remains strong. Current ophthalmology chief of staff Dr. David Plager will be in attendance, as will others from Riley.
Clody even recently learned that the One Eye is notable in its long-running support of Riley.
“We are the longest-running charitable group to have supported any one department that Riley’s ever had,” Clody said. “I didn’t know it.”
Brad Alspaugh, who has played in the tournament from the beginning and still serves as a co-organizer, hopes to go out with a bang. While it would be departure from recent years, he’s hoping to raise $18,000 to bring the total money to $200,000 over the tournament’s history.
To do so, the tournament not only needs participants, but sponsors. All donations are tax deductible.
Anyone interested in playing or a sponsorship may contact Clody at 653-9322, Alspaugh at 653-7273 or Jo Corbitt at 247-9426.
It’s not for lack of passion that they’ll be calling it quits. Clody still keeps a 1996 Banner Graphic clipping of the fourth-annual event tacked up at his house and can recall how Alspaugh’s team edged his for the tournament title.
With the teams tied for low score, it went to a chip-off and E.J. Rosengarten placed his just inside of Clody’s to give a team that also included Barb Young and Mike Cherry the title.
It’s the task of organizing the tournament and subsequent reception at Greencastle Elks Lodge 1077 that’s become taxing on organizers.
“It’s run its course, I think,” Clody said. ”And who’s to say it may never kick off again? I know I’m tired and the other guys are tired. Maybe somebody will get energetic and start it up again.”
He also knows that the tradition of golfing with one eye won’t be going anywhere just yet.
“Brad and I were talking and we know there’ll be eight or so of us go out and throw money in the hat,” Clody said.
For now, there’s still the fun of watching some fool put on an eye patch and try to hit a ball with one eye for the very first time. Clody will be playing this time with his son and 13-year-old grandson, who got his first taste of the One Eye last year.
“He was saying, ‘How do you do it? This is stupid,’” Clody said with a grin. “But I know he enjoyed it.”