Teeing up in memory

Coming up on Friday, Sept. 28, at Smoky Hills Country Club is the ninth annual Rick Bauer Memorial Charity Golf Outing to benefit Mary Elizabeth Maternity Home.

The Rick Bauer Memorial is an annual golf outing put on by the friends of Dr. Rick Bauer, who passed away from cancer in 2001.

Rick Bauer was such a wonderful man, who made everyone around him feel like the most important person on earth. As an obstetrician, Rick was always committed to bringing healthy babies into this world. During the 15 years he practiced obstetrics in Hays, Rick delivered over half of the babies born. For that reason, Mary Elizabeth Maternity Home is such a great charity to receive the proceeds of this fundraiser because Mary Elizabeth Maternity Home is committed to helping young moms who have nowhere to go, have a place to stay while awaiting the birth of their baby. The slogan for the golf outing is; "Come celebrate the life of a great friend while helping to raise money for a great cause."

Rick Bauer will always be remembered for his winning smile, contagious laugh and deep love for God, his wife, Cindy, his daughters, Tara and Tessa, and for that matter anyone else he came in contact with.

Golfers are encouraged to put together a team to play in this three person scramble format but singles are welcome to enter and they will be placed on a team.

More than $1,500 in prizes will be given away; everyone who registers will go home with a great prize. Each golfer who puts their ball on the 11th green with their first shot gets their name put into a drawing to win a cash prize.

Paul MacDonald, Don Tillman, Tom Wasinger and Doug Williams, four of Rick's golf buddies witnessed him make a "hole in one" on Smoky Hill's 11th hole soon after Rick had surgery to remove sinus cancer that had developed.

Another interesting twist to this golf outing is that each three person team gets to play a 4th ball on every hole. Everyone who enters will receive a Calloway golf ball with a big red "R" written on it, so it is as if Rick were playing every hole with all the golfers. Paul MacDonald, who starts the golf outing each year by playing "Amazing Grace" on his bagpipes, says that people tell him all the time, "this is the most enjoyable golf outing of the year."

Rick's daughter, Tara, who played golf at Hays High "strokes out the first ball" on hole one in tribute to her dad.

Another fun part of the tourney is that each member of the winning team is awarded the coveted "white jacket." Instead of the "green jacket" that is given to the winner of The Masters in Augusta, Ga., each year, the winners of the Bauer Memorial get to wear white doctors' lab coats for a memorial picture.

If you are interested in either sponsoring a hole or playing, make checks payable to Rick Bauer Memorial and send them to Mary Elizabeth Maternity Home, PO Box 132, Hays, KS 67601. For more information, call (785) 625-6800 or email mail@paulmac.com.

Kyle Ermoian

Hays