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Like a lot of folks cruising through Northeast Michigan, George and Theresa Sutherland figured the UAW’s Black Lake Golf Club was for union members only.
But just for the heck of it, the Detroit-area couple, who own a cabin between Rogers City and Cheboygan, decided to take a chance and stop in one recent summer weekday.
“I thought since I’m a teacher and belong to the Michigan Education Association, that maybe they’d let us play,” Theresa Sutherland said.
To their delight, the Sutherlands learned that anyone can play the course.
She hit off the green tees, he from the white, and 18 holes later, they were raving about the serenity and scenery.
“That’s the biggest misconception out there,” Pam Phipps, Black Lake’s director of golf, said of the assumption that the course is for union members only. “We’re open to everyone.”
About 40 percent of golfers at Black Lake are UAW members – who do have privileges, Phipps said. Members get a 20 percent discount, and retirees get 30 percent off.
The UAW owns the 5-year-old golf club as well as the larger resort the course sits upon: The Walter and May Reuther Family Education Center, which opened in 1970.
The recreational education center was the dream of Walter Reuther, the renowned union organizer and civil rights leader. Reuther, son of German immigrants, was instrumental in unionizing the workers at Ford Motor Co. He became president of the UAW in 1946.
Reuther believed strongly in worker education, and work began on a UAW education center near Black Lake in the late 1960s. The Reuthers died in a plane crash on the way to the center in 1970, and Walter Reuther’s colleagues paid them tribute by naming the facility in their honor.
The lodge is now a full-service resort and conference center featuring the Old Lodge (where Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball are said to have honeymooned), as well as more modern, hotel-style accommodations, family suites and condos. Guests play basketball in a gymnasium with arched wood ceilings, shoot pool or play pingpong at the recreation center; take a dip in the Olympic-sized pool; or play tennis or bocce ball. The modern golf clubhouse, with redwood, cedar and Wisconsin stone interior and windows overlooking the course, features a restaurant, bar and pro shop.
Phipps, who’s in charge of making all the purchases for the golf course, adheres to resort policy of buying products made in the USA if possible.
“My supplier list gets slimmer and slimmer every year,” Phipps lamented. Take golf gloves, for example. “Nobody in the United States makes them anymore,” she said. “I have to get them from Indochina.”
As for the Sutherlands, they were glad they finally experienced the Black Lake Golf Club, especially when they learned that on Tuesdays, the greens fee is just $50.
“It was very fair and challenging,” Theresa said. “Even if you’re golfing bad, the scenery puts you in a serene mood.”
George agreed.
“All skill levels can play here,” he said. “It’s just a great course.”