Grand Haven Mens Golf Assoc.
Spotlight Golfer
John Douglas
John Douglas was born in Louisville, Kentucky while his father was finishing seminary and moved to Dresden, Tennessee about 6 months later. Yes, he is a preacher's kid which explains a lot. John is the third of three boys. At six John's family moved to Tunica, Mississippi and this was home until he completed high school. He then went on to earn a BS in Marketing at Mississippi State University where in his senior year he served as President of the Student Government. After graduating, he moved to the Dallas, Texas area to work as a Field Representative for Congressman Jim Collins.
It didn't take John long to learn that politics was not his passion so after a short stint in retail furniture, John found his way into the financial services field which did prove to be his life long career. John met his future wife at Southwestern Life Insurance Company in Dallas, which is interesting since Debbie grew up in Johnstown, PA. During the next stage of his career, serving in several positions at TIAA-CREF over the next 25 years at the company. His last 9 years at TIAA were spent creating and heading the west region for Wealth Management, where he was responsible for financial planning for all colleges and universities west of the Mississippi River. Also during his time at TIAA, John earned a Master Degree in Financial Services.
During the tenure at TIAA, Debbie and John had two sons, which meant weekends coaching baseball, watching soccer, basketball and traveling to cross country meets. The oldest son graduated from Colorado School of Mines with a BS in Physics and a Master's in Nuclear Engineering. He is now completing a doctorate in Medical Physics at Texas A & M University. The youngest son graduated from Trinity University in San Antonio and is now in Albuquerque, NM, working for Fidelity Investments following in his parent's footsteps in financial services.
Upon retirement in 2013, Debbie and John decided to relocate from the Dallas area to Palm Coast, after having visited Debbie's parents in Palm Coast since 1985. After building their house on Front Street, they moved to Grand Haven in 2014.
John has enjoyed playing golf the last three years, since he now plays more rounds in a month than he played in the previous 40 years. Upon meeting John, you immediately realize that with his tall, slim, aerodynamic build he was a distance runner. Seriously John completed over 20 marathons from 1999 through 2008 and started two ,100 mile runs in Leadville, CO, which ended before the finish line, once due to a lack of altitude adjustment and once due to running into a time cutoff. John has yet to bike seriously in Florida but in Texas he enjoyed weekend 100k rides, a few 100 mile rides and 4 MS 150's in Texas and Colorado. Debbie and John's sons have asked him to run in a relay race in October, where each person of the eight members on the team will run a 3 mile, a 5 mile and an 8 mile leg until completed. If you see John by the side of the road in the fetal position, don't worry as he is just taking a breather from his training.
John enjoys the friends he has found in the MGA and looks forward to bringing his handicap down.
John serves on the MGA Board as Grounds liaison with the club and will be the MGA Tournament director this next year. He is an asset to our Grand Haven community and Golf Club. The next time you see John, congratulate him on being our “SPOTLIGHT GOLFER “ for the second quarter of 2017.