Oscar Miles, CGCS

Editor's note: This is the last of three expanded biographies of this year's recipients of GCSAA's Distinguished Service Awards. The abbreviated versions can be found in the February issue of GCM.

With a nine-hole golf course four blocks from his house and older brothers who caddied there, the golf course was a natural fit for Oscar Miles, CGCS, from the very beginning. In his hometown of Quincy, Ill., he got his start in the field as a caddy, then a grounds crew member, and finally a head greenskeeper at Cedar Crest CC, all by the age of 17. As a caddy, Miles was allowed to golf on Mondays after walking from green to green with a kitchen knife and cutting crabgrass, an enemy no chemical solution existed for at the time.

After graduating high school, Miles went to work at Westview CC in 1957, which hosted an Iowa GCSA meeting where Fred Grau, Ph.D., was a guest speaker. Grau told Miles about a new program under Dr. Musser at Penn State University, the first land-grant college with a turf management certificate. With the help of a scholarship from GCSAA, Miles graduated in 1961 in the second graduating class from that program. Dr. Duich at Penn State helped out his students with on-the-job placement, and placed Miles with Bob Williams, a past president of GCSAA, at Bob-O-Link in Chicago. But that same year, Miles was lured to work back in his hometown at Quincy CC.

The Cuban Missile Crisis interrupted that stint, when Miles got his draft notice, applied for the army reserve and spent six months on active duty. He made it back to Quincy in time for the 1963 season with enough time to ready the course for the 1964 Illinois Women's Open, the biggest women's golf event in the state.

As a 24-year-old, Miles was then recruited to work at the prestigious Olympia Fields (Ill.) CC and started there in late 1964. He conducted extensive research at Olympia Fields, which became known as the yellow stripe course for its test plots. In his first year, Miles weathered a storm that knocked down 1,100 trees and left branches stuck 2 to 3 feet deep in greens. With his savvy and the hire of a good tree surgeon, Miles cleaned up the course in only six weeks. In 1968, Olympia Fields hosted Western Open, and Miles won GCSAA's Achievement Award for his work hosting a high caliber tournament three years after the big storm.

Miles went on to host several more Western Opens at Olympia Fields, and another renowned venue, Butler National GC in Oak Brook, Ill. But before that, he went to work at Broadmoor CC in Indianapolis, where Miles was given the green light to research and spent many years studying soil temperatures. A recession in 1978 led to a 40 percent budget cut and decreased membership. "All we could do was maintain the greens," Miles says. "I just saw the fairways go to a scorched earth." But Miles took the opportunity to experiment with different fairway treatments and present a regrassing plan to members as the recession ended. Before the fairways were redone, though, Miles was recruited to Butler National, and spent a month working a week at each course before moving full-time to Butler.

There, Miles and Dr. J.M. Duich implemented a program to treat greens with methyl bromide to eliminate weeds, diseases and bacteria. Miles also was one of the first superintendnets to maintain fairways like greens with triplex mowers after converting to Penneagle bentgrass. He hosted several Western Opens at Butler, and in 1985, earned the PGA's Achievement Award for best PGA Course of the Year.

For the 1987 Western Open, Miles handled another major disaster, this time a flood that ruined seven greens before the event. In 10 days, he got the course playable with replaced pumps, generators, $10,000 for helicopters to dry the fairways, and 100 people helping the cause and pushing mud around, Miles says.

In 1989, Miles went to The Merit Club in Libertyville, Ill., which was then just being built and opened in 1992. In 2000, the club hosted the U.S. Women's Open. Miles retired in 2006. A 45-year GCSAA member, Miles served on various GCSAA committees during his career, is a past president of the Illinois Turfgrass Foundation and also mentored more than 75 interns.

Miles lives with his wife, Mardelle. They have three children, Judy, Susan and Brent, four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Comments

[Colorado Springs]

Miles was a real inovator in his day and everyone should be grateful as they play there next round.