There’s a longstanding tradition at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club — when someone considered part of the family at the world-famous course, founded in 1891, dies, the club flag is lowered to half-staff.
Anyone playing the course, working there or simply driving past down Tuckahoe Road over the weekend might have noticed the large, mostly red rectangular club flag, with narrow navy and white stripes at the top and bottom, snapping in the breeze just halfway up the flagpole, under overcast, gunmetal skies.
It was a simple tribute acknowledging that the club, which has hosted five U.S. Open Championships, the most recent this past June, had lost one of its most beloved and cherished mainstays, senior greenskeeper Ron Eleazer.
Eleazer, a Shinnecock Nation member, father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and the only member of the club’s maintenance staff who worked at every modern Open hosted by the club, died on August 1. He was 75.
His loss was felt deeply not only among the many employees and members at the historic golf club, but also on the nearby Shinnecock Territory, where Eleazer was born and raised, where he raised his own family, and where he called home his entire life.
People who knew him best, both from the Shinnecock Nation and at the world-renowned golf course that bears the name and likeness of his people agreed that the word “legend” was not hyperbole when applied to Eleazer.
In his later years, he exuded the quiet confidence of a natural leader. He was tall and lean, still carrying the handsomeness and charisma he’d wielded during his youth, still carrying himself with the understanding that he was destined to be out in front.
As the lead driver in the cavalry of bright red, brand new Toro mowers that cut Shinnecock’s fairways with laser-like precision during the predawn hours for the week of the U.S. Open, that was his position. And in that role, he was clearly in his element, in command of the high-stakes job at hand, preparing the course, which had the eyes of the world on it that week as it hosted one of golf’s major championships.
There was nowhere else he’d have rather been. It always felt like home, he said, and that’s because it was. The course was built on ancestral Shinnecock land, and the place where Eleazer grew up and lived almost his entire life was just a stone’s throw south across the highway.
A Family Man
One small but telling indicator of the power and magnetism of someone’s personality, and the impact they had on the people around them, is the number of nicknames they acquire throughout their life.
Co-workers, caddies and members at Shinnecock knew him simply as Snoop, a nickname he inherited, he said in an interview in early June, from a former maintenance team member and another Shinnecock tribal member, Jim Smith, who retired around the same time Eleazer started working at the club full time.
Peter Smith, also Shinnecock, who was course superintendent from 1980 to 1999, referred to Eleazer as “Buff,” short for Buffalo — White Buffalo to be exact, a moniker Eleazer said was a Native name he earned as a child, and was a nod to the rarity of a white buffalo and its associated symbolism with leadership.
To family and friends who knew him outside the context of his life and career at the golf course, Eleazer had a handful of other nicknames as well — Duke, Claude Duke, Quick Claude, references to his athleticism and the quick hands that made him formidable on the basketball court or in a boxing showdown.
To Pastor Curtis Terry, Eleazer was simply Uncle Duke.
Terry, now 59, still calls him by that name when speaking about him, and his reminiscences illustrate another big feature of Eleazer’s life and personality — his enduring presence as a family man, someone who always showed love — sometimes tough, sometimes soft, but always present — to his siblings, children, grandchildren and extended family, which, as Terry explained, is quite expansive.
Eleazer was the fifth oldest of 10 children, born to James Warren Eleazer and Francis Bess on December 30, 1950.
Curtis Terry, the son of Eleazer’s sister, Sheila Terry, was Eleazer’s oldest nephew, but Curtis explained that for him, Uncle Duke was more like a father. Curtis, as well as another of Eleazer’s nephews, Mike Gillam, both grew up without a father around, he explained, and said Eleazer stepped in to fill that void, before he had children of his own. Curtis Terry referred to him as a legend, a superhero, a protector, and one of a kind.
“My uncle was a loving man,” Curtis said. “He had his imperfections, like all of us do. I knew him through all his ups and downs and twists and turns. But he was a family man. He’s the one who shaped us and molded us.”
Toria Eleazer is the youngest of Eleazer’s six children. (He also has 24 grandchildren and six great-grandchildren).
The through line of being a strong, family-oriented patriarch continued for Eleazer as he became a father and grandfather. Toria Eleazer recalled with fondness how her father interacted with her three boys, when they came to visit from Virginia Beach, and with his other nieces and nephews.
“He’d pop over to take the kids to Carvel, especially when they were younger,” she said.
He’d walk in the house and greet the boys enthusiastically, she said, asking them for high-fives, would come over early in the morning and take them for breakfast, and always had a bit of cash in hand to give out.
“He had a real animated way of communicating with the kids,” she said.
A Love Affair With the Game, and the Course
Eleazer attended Southampton High School for a period of time, but before graduating he was drafted into the Marine Corps in 1968, during the Vietnam War era, and shipped off to boot camp. He was honorably discharged in March 1970, returned home, and held a series of different jobs over the years before joining Shinnecock Hills for good in 1988.
Eleazer had first worked at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club when he was just 12 years old, like many of his peers at the time. He told that story in early June, sitting in the maintenance staff building at the golf course less than a month before the start of the Open. In the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s, and even the early 2000s, a large number of the caddies and maintenance staff employees were Shinnecock. In the last 20 years, that has changed, but Eleazer’s long history with the club and his enduring presence there represented an important link to that history.
With a mischievous look in his eye, he shared that he became a caddie at Shinnecock before he was even technically a teenager, lying about his age to secure the gig.
“I was actually 12, but I was tall for my age,” he said, with a sly smile.
“Everybody used to caddie up here from the Res. It was only $1.75 a bag back then. It wasn’t much.”
But Eleazer and his other friends earned something else by working there: A lifelong love of the game. They had Charlie Thom, the legendary Scotsman who was the club pro at Shinnecock for more than 50 years, to thank for that.
“He taught a lot of guys from the Res how to play golf,” Eleazer said.
Thom planted a seed that blossomed for a lifetime, even though it would be years before Eleazer would return to Shinnecock and settle into a nearly 40-year career at the course. He fell in love with the game, and would play all the time, at courses around the East End, like Indian Island and Cherry Creek. He joined the Shinnecock Golfers Association, a longstanding group of men and women from the Shinnecock Nation that play and compete in tournaments together, both locally and abroad. He served as president of the association for a long time, until his wife, Donna, became ill with cancer and he devoted his time to caring for her until her death in 2024.
Eleazer wasn’t content just to play the game. His love for it made him want to share it with others.
One of those people was Mitch Williams. Turning Mitch onto the game wasn’t an easy task, which is perhaps why Eleazer wanted to do it. Mitch came from a family of golfers — his father and brothers loved the game and had caddied at Shinnecock — but he considered himself more of a contact sports kind of guy.
Williams, who is 69 now, didn’t start playing golf until he was in his late 40s, and it was a struggle at first. That’s when Eleazer stepped in to help.
“I would always lift my head up when I was hitting the ball,” Williams said. “Anybody who knows anything about golf knows you can’t swing at the ball and look up to see where it’s going.”
When Williams would get off of work, he’d go pick up Eleazer, and they’d go play nine holes at a local course, sometimes in Riverhead or the surrounding area. Eleazer helped teach Williams how to keep his head down and hit the ball properly, and when he fixed that problem, he told Williams the next thing he had to work on was his follow-through.
“Before you know it, I really started liking the game,” Williams said, something he feels wouldn’t have happened if not for Eleazer. “He took his time, and he was very gentle and kind, and he showed me the game.”
Toria Eleazer remembered her father taking her to the driving range when she was in high school, and giving her a few introductory pointers. It wasn’t something they did often, she said, but she remembered always enjoying it. In the weeks before his illness and death, and in the days after, Toria said she found herself reflecting on her father’s love for golf and what it meant to him, something she said she didn’t consider too much previously.
“He persuaded a lot of people to get into it,” she said. “I knew he was always golfing but I didn’t realize what it meant to him. I just thought, that’s what old men do, they play golf. Before he got really sick, I told him I’d decided I was going to take an interest in golf, and that he needed to be ready to be annoyed with all my questions. I told him, I’m serious, I’m going to go buy [golf clubs].”
In the days before he died, Eleazer told his daughter that he would leave his golf clubs to her.
The Course He Called Home
Eleazer had short stints at Southampton Golf Club and National Golf Links, the other storied courses in the area, before settling in at Shinnecock when Peter Smith offered him a job in 1988. It was a natural fit, for so many reasons. Among them: Eleazer’s grandmother’s brother was Oscar Bunn, a Shinnecock who worked at the course as a caddie, was taught the game by another Scottish professional, Willie Dunn, and by 1896, was competing in the U.S. Open at Shinnecock, the first time the course hosted it and only the second time the championship was contested. In that interview in June, Eleazer referred to Bunn as “Uncle Oscar.”
It was a job he loved, a fact that was evident to his family, and to those who worked alongside him.
“He very much loved what he was doing,” his daughter Toria said. “As an adult, I envy that. We’ve all had jobs we didn’t love, but my dad built a career around a passion, and that was very admirable.”
He was certainly admired by the people who worked with him every day.
Jonathan Jennings is the course superintendent at Shinnecock, and was in that leadership role for both the 2018 and 2026 U.S. Open Championships held at Shinnecock. He said he was honored to have Eleazer by his side all those years, and spoke about how he instilled confidence in him to do the job well.
They also were together for the 2004 Open at Shinnecock, when Jennings, who held superintendent jobs at several other top-notch courses, joined the staff for the week as a volunteer, a few years before he’d get the superintendent’s job.
“I first met Snoop in 2004,” Jennings said earlier this week. “I mowed fairways with him a few evenings. I have a vivid memory of following behind him as we were mowing, and when we turned around, he said, ‘the next fairway, you do the center line,’ and I said, ‘are you kidding me? You’re working here and I’m just a volunteer.’ But he instilled confidence in people and had a really gentle way of guiding people.”
Matt Smith is assistant superintendent at Shinnecock, and the nephew of former superintendent Peter Smith. He’s also a Shinnecock tribal member. He called Eleazer “the king of the fairways.”
“Any time he was on that machine, his presence was felt,” he said. “He always took the lead and made sure everyone fell in line.”
Smith said that Eleazer “showed him the ropes” when it came to cutting fairways, and he did it with style.
“Every time we’d stop to empty our buckets into the grass clippings cart, he’d smile and say, ‘Your grandpa always used to say, keep your back to the wind and your face to the sun,’” Smith said. “Then he’d laugh as someone dumped their clippings into the wind, only to have them blow right back in their face.
“Snoop was more than just a coworker — he was a fixture at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club,” Smith continued. “He carried on traditions, shared stories, and made everyone around him better with his knowledge, humor, and leadership. Snoop will always be remembered as one of the greats, and he will truly be missed.”
Eleazer’s leadership, knowledge and expertise earned him the reputation he built at Shinnecock, but it was the overall pride he took in his work and in the place itself that made him stand out.
Shinnecock Hills Golf Club President Brett Pickett spoke about Eleazer’s value to the golf club and what he meant to everyone there, from his fellow maintenance staff co-workers to the members. He also spoke about Eleazer’s long tenure at the golf course, what it meant, what it symbolized, and why it mattered.
“Snoop was a big deal,” he said. “He had enduring success on our team that transcended eras in the greens profession and through that he demonstrated great strength, talent, and resilience. He symbolized and embodied really important continuity as it relates to the Shinnecock’s uninterrupted care of the course. Snoop was kind of a bedrock and his importance to us in that regard can’t be understated.”
Several people, including Pickett, Jennings and general manager Nick Conlin, mentioned that in addition to his expertise in greenskeeping and his care of the fairways, in particular, Eleazer also took care of the bright red geraniums that circle the front porch of the clubhouse. It was a small job in the grand scheme of his daily responsibilities, but it made him visible to many members, Pickett said.
“They were always perfect. He took great pride in them and in the whole property. He really loved the place and thought of it as home.”
Eleazer’s genuine care for the golf course, his pride in his work, and his love of the game did not go unnoticed by those around him. A few years ago, the club granted Eleazer a standing tee time, and allowed him the use of a cart, because of his age, any time he wanted to get out on the course and play.
His daughter Toria said that meant a lot to him, but she said he preferred to keep the knowledge of that privilege to himself and a tight circle.
“She knew people would’ve started calling him and begging to go,” she said.
Toria mentioned that Eleazer took her husband to play there once, and she said her husband shared with her the news, after their round, that her father was like a celebrity at the course.
“At every turn, he said that somebody was waving to him, coming up to shake his hand,” she said. “He knew everybody, the people who were playing and the people who were working.”
Knowing how beloved he was at the golf course, and how much he loved being there is something Toria said comforts her and makes her happy.
She visited the area during the U.S. Open in June, and went to the tournament one day. Walking around the course, as it was hosting the national championship, she said she felt a sense of why the job mattered so much to her father, and felt the power of that enduring connection.
“I went out knowing and understanding that this is Shinnecock ancestral territory and I’m walking amongst my ancestors and honoring them with just my presence,” she said. “And my dad was out there daily, honoring the ancestors every day.”
A visitation will be held Monday, August 10, from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the Brockett Funeral Home in Southampton. There will be a viewing on Tuesday, August 11, from 10 to 11 a.m. with a funeral service at 11 a.m. at the First Presbyterian Church of Southampton, and interment to follow at Shinnecock Cemetery.