January 2002

I attended the University of Virginia, obtaining a Masters in Mechanical Engineering in 1989. I currently work at America Online as a senior manager of a systems development group. I was injured in an accidental fall while at college in 1985, resulting in a spinal cord injury at T9. That's roughly at the navel. I currently reside in Fairfax, Virginia, with my wife of 11 years, our 21-month-old-twins, Olivia and Trevor, and our dog, Molly.

After my injury I started thinking that I should play golf. All my friends were playing and I just didn't want to miss any of the fun. So, in 1987 I started making phone calls. I made hundreds! Along the way I met Dennis Walters, who encouraged and inspiried me to stick with it. He's become a great friend - I like to say that he's taught me everything I know about golf, unfortunately he hasn't taught me everything he knows about golf! I got some help from Ed Eckenhoff at NRH, who gave me a golf cart, and the folks at Fairfax County Park Authority were all behind me. So, with a lot of help from some very good friends, I modified the golf cart so that I could drive around the course and swivel around to hit balls while sitting in it. In 1990 I hit my first ball on a golf course and was hooked immediately. All the struggling paid off in a big way in 1992 as I made a hole in one at my home course. I think I released a lot of built-up energy at that moment and am certain everybody on the property knew what happend!

Since then I have just tried to get better every year, play as much golf as possible and give back to the community whenever possible. I've played in my company's golf league for years, I've played on business travel and vacation, and competed in dozens of tournaments, sometime bringing home trophies, sometimes threatening to sell my clubs the next day. I have had a number of scores in the 80's and generally shoot in the 90's. I've held a number of golf clinics over the years to introduce golf to people with disabilities, both kids and adults. I try to tell each person what golf has done for me and help them get as much as they desire out of the game. I've also volunteered at the US Senior Open and US Open at Congressional Country Club, running a committe to provide acces to the course for disabled patrons. The US Open was a particularly rewarding experience and I have a number of great stories to tell. Over the years I've consulted with a couple of the companies that make single-rider adapted golf cars, hoping that I might help make a better cart for everyone.

I hope to see you on the links soon. Hit 'em straight!

Some of the events along the way

Still waiting for second hole-in-one