The Garden City Telegram
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Brookover family sells Southwind
Published 12/31/2008 in News : Business
By BRETT MARSHALL
For the first time since its opening in the fall of 1979, Southwind Country Club will no longer be under the management of or tied to financial commitments by the Brookover Companies.
The Brookover family said Tuesday it is selling Southwind, which includes 208 irrigated acres and some additional, nonirrigated land on the property, to Craig Boomhower of Garden City.
Boomhower, a general partner in Garnand Funeral Home and founder of Boomhower Funeral Home in Dighton in 1979, said Tuesday he was not ready to discuss or answer questions about its new management.
The announcement came in a brief e-mail from Ty Brookover, assistant manager of Brookover Land Properties. Brookover would not comment further about the sale.
According to Brookover, Boomhower will assume operations of Southwind Country Club the first week of January, while Southwind Development Co. will continue to be owned and operated by Brookover.
The sale price was not announced, but 2008 Finney County appraisals have the property appraised at $973,000.
Boomhower, a member at Southwind Country Club, also is president of Ranger Feeders II LLC, a commercial cattle feeding company east of Dighton.
On Monday, at about 4:30 p.m., Southwind golf professional Dale Bowne said he received a phone call saying his services were no longer needed.
"I was told that I was no longer employed, and it was my understanding that the sale was about an hour before that," Bowne said from his home Tuesday night. "I guess with the new owner and going in a different direction that I'm not shocked, just taken aback that the (new) owner could run it in that manner."
Bowne said every department head, with the exception of golf course superintendent Casey Sullivan, was dismissed. That group would include General Manager Randall Conradt, Food and Beverage Director Jill Strode, Executive Chef Jean Kennedy and Bowne. Conradt, Strode and Kennedy are not listed in the phone book.
Bowne, formerly the golf professional at Milburn Golf and Country Club in Overland Park, arrived at Southwind in April 2007. He was recommended for the job by Randy Hunt, Milburn's general manager and the first golf professional at Buffalo Dunes Golf Course in 1976. Earl C. Brookover Sr. also donated the land for Buffalo Dunes to the city of Garden City.
Darin Hopkins, a member of the Southwind Board of Directors, said Tuesday night he knew little about the sale of the club.
"The board has not really been functioning for some time," Hopkins said. "We were pretty much an advisory board, and I just looked at it as the loop had gotten closed on our involvement."
Sean Thayer, a 1999 Kansas Amateur Champion, said he thought the sale to Boomhower would be good for the club membership.
"I'm pretty excited about it," Thayer said. "Craig will do a first-class job; he'll do it right. I've been hearing about the possibility (of the sale) for about two weeks, and my thinking is that the right person bought it."
Thayer had been a member of Southwind since its opening and played golf at Garden City High School and for the University of Kansas Jayhawks. He turned professional in the early 1990s for several years before regaining his amatuer status. He has been a supporter of Southwind and helped publicize the Pro-Am with golf pros around the country.
"Craig gets around, he travels and plays (golf) different places. He understands what the club needs, and I think it will be a great situation," Thayer said. "The Brookovers have done so much for golf in Garden City that I think their contribution should not be forgotten."
In 1978, the Brookovers, Earl C. Sr. and Jr., began the planning and construction of Southwind Country Club, three miles south of Garden City in the sand hills.
They hired Oklahoma architect Don Sechrest, and what became a reality in the fall of 1979 eventually turned into one of Kansas' top golf courses. A links-style layout cut out of the high dunes, and only a few trees dot the landscape of Southwind.
Since 1982, Southwind, along with Buffalo Dunes, has been the annual site of the Southwest Kansas Pro-Am, the largest charitable golf tournament in western Kansas.
Through the past 29 years, the charity event has raised more than $700,000 for the Newborn Intensive Care Unit at St. Catherine Hospital in Garden City.
Kent Colvin of Liberal and president of High Plains Pizza Hut, which owns the Garden City Pizza Hut and is the major sponsor of the Pro-Am, was in southern California early today and was unaware of the sale.
"I know nothing about it, but I do know that Craig was involved with the Pro-Am," Colvin said. "I'll just have to wait and see. I'm sure we'll have discussions about how the Pro-Am will be handled."
In 1990, the Kansas Golf Association brought its most prestigious championship, the Kansas Amateur, to Southwind. It was the first time in 82 years that the state tournament had been played west of Hutchinson. The Amateur returned in 1999 and again in 2006.
The KGA now has its annual High Plains Amateur Championship at Southwind every August, bringing together top players from Kansas, Colorado and New Mexico.
The Brookover family has had Southwind Country Club on the market for many years.
In an April 1999 Telegram story, then-Brookover President and CEO Bill Baxter said that the club had not turned a profit but that it would still be for sale even if it had. Baxter said at the time that Southwind and golf was not the core business of the Brookover Companies and that E.C. Brookover Sr. had never intended to own and operate the country club.
Reporter Shajia Ahmad contributed to this report.
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