Golf Association of Michigan Plans #GAM100 Celebration Events all year long
Jack Nicklaus will join Michigan golfers in June to help celebrate GAM’s first 100 years.
Nicklaus will headline a June 17 gala fundraiser that includes golf at Oakland Hills Country Club. Opportunities will be made available for ticketed reservations to play the famed South Course that day, and for meeting Nicklaus.
All proceeds from the event will benefit the Youth on Course program in our state through the Golf Association of Michigan Foundation. 
Two years ago, the GAM Foundation was established to serve as the charitable arm of the association. It has made significant impact early on with the adoption of the national Youth on Course program. Last season 4,513 youth participated and played over 6,000 rounds at 93 Michigan golf facilities.
Nicklaus won the 1991 U.S. Senior Open on the South Course in a playoff with Chi Chi Rodriguez, and where 30 years earlier he finished fourth in the 1961 U.S. Open as a 21-year-old amateur.
“Jack Nicklaus is the greatest golfer of all-time and it will be great to have him back at Oakland Hills,” said David Graham, who will retire in June as the longest tenured executive director of the GAM with 18 years of service. “He has three great golf courses he designed in Michigan—TPC of Michigan, Harbor Shores in Benton Harbor and The Bear at Grand Traverse Resort—and he has epitomized a level of excellence for me and many of Michigan’s golfers over the years.”
June 17 also serves as the final practice day for the top amateurs playing in the 108th Michigan Amateur Championship, which will be contested that week, Tuesday through Saturday, on the North Course at Oakland Hills.
Up first in April, the Detroit Golf Club — one of the GAM’s original 14-member clubs and the site of the PGA Tour’s return to Michigan for the 2019 Rocket Mortgage Classic — will host the GAM Annual Meeting on Monday, April 22. Both Donald Ross classic courses will be available for the GAM 100 Celebration, and there will be special pricing to encourage broad golfer participation.
The Annual Meeting will feature the presentation of annual awards, including the Distinguished Service Award and Player of the Year honors, a special guest speaker, a series of meetings and workshops for delegates and golf. Invitations will go out soon.
In the first 100 years, the GAM has evolved from a men’s private association to a state-wide, all-inclusive association for public and private clubs and golfers. Today it serves 60,000 golf members and 470 clubs and courses.
Last year the GAM provided 35 championships for golfers age seven to 70-plus, and also administered 40 qualifiers for the major GAM championships and 18 for the USGA and their schedule of national championships. Significantly, the GAM also continues to administer the GAM/USGA Handicap System and measures and rates almost 70 courses a year.
“It’s going to be a great year for the GAM, one that celebrates our past as well as our future,” Graham said.
