Minnesota Golf Hall of Fame
Nicki Nordstrom Reuterfeldt’s winning ways span five decades and three states. Her first championship came at the Minnesota Women’s Golf Association’s Stroke Play in 1964 (she successfully defended in 1965), and her last at the Minnesota Women’s Public Golf Association’s Senior Public Links in 2009 (but perhaps not her final championship). In between Reuterfeldt has collected a bevy of championships and competitive accomplishments: two state senior amateurs (1997-98), two state public links (1978, 1999), and nine state senior public links (1996-2003; 2009). She has participated in many national and state women’s championships outside of Minnesota, including the Florida Women’s State Amateur (she won in 1975), and the Florida West Coast Invitational, which she dominated from 1967 to 1977, winning seven times.
Reuterfeldt played well in the USGA’s Women’s Amateur, Women’s Amateur Public Links and Women’s Senior Amateur, finishing 17th, 9th and 27th, respectively. She is a member of the Edina High School Athletic Hall of Fame, and continues to contribute to amateur golf as a volunteer at the annual MWGA Junior Girls’ Golf Clinics.
David M. Tentis has found success as a competitive amateur and professional golfer, both home and abroad. He has beat the best at home, winning the State Amateur title in 1984 and the State Open in 2002, and abroad, playing for a victorious U.S. Walker Cup team (1983), and winning on the Canadian Tour (1987). He has qualified for four PGA Championships (2002-2005) and a U.S. Open (1984), as well as earning a coveted invitation to the 1984 Masters Tournament. Injury ended his tenure on the PGA Tour (1989-90), yet since that time Tentis has been a competitive force on the local professional scene, winning the Tapemark Charity Pro-Am four times, the Minnesota Golf Champions three times, and a Minnesota Section PGA championship.
Julie Gumlia (Marvel) enjoyed a competitive golf career from a young age (she was ranked 9th as a junior amateur by Golf Digest magazine in 1973), winning her first State Amateur championship in 1971 at the Minnesota Women’s State Match Play when she was just 14. Gumlia won the State Junior Girls’ Championship in 1971, and four years later, she won both the junior girls’ and the Women’s State Amateur (stroke play) championships. That fall she entered the University of Minnesota and later earned a Big Ten Co-Champion individual and team title (1978). Twice she won the Women’s State Amateur Four-Ball Championship partnering with her mother, Jody Gumlia (1973-74).
When the U.S. Women’s Open visited Hazeltine National Golf Club in 1977, Gumlia qualified but failed to make the cut. She also qualified for the women’s open two years later. That year (1979) Gumlia won her first “national” event at the prestigious North-South Amateur, and was ranked 5th as an amateur golfer in the U.S. by Golf Digest.
Mike Fermoyle’s amateur golf career features state titles in five different decades, beginning with the State Public Links (1969), three State Amateurs (1970, 1973 and 1980), and four State Four-Ball championships (1972, 1985, 1993 and 2001). Fermoyle was medalist at the Pine to Palm in 1971, won the Resorters in 1972, made the cut at the State Amateur 18 consecutive years (1969 to 1986), the last being 2000, and amassed 13 top-ten finishes. Fermoyle also made it to the semi-final matches at the MGA’s annual match play championship, the Players’, in 1982 and 1987.
Fermoyle enjoyed a career as a sportswriter at the St. Paul Pioneer Press Dispatch before retiring in 2006. Two years later he began a second career covering the golf beat exclusively for the MGA and its website, mngolf.org, where he ranks individual prep golfers and teams, provides coverage on local amateur and professional tournaments and keeps tabs on how Minnesotans are faring on the various professional tours.
Chet Latawiec began his golf career as a caddie at the now-defunct Hilltop Golf Club in Columbia Heights in 1930 making 40 cents a loop. By 15 Latawiec won his first tournament, the 1935 Twin Cities Rotary Club Junior Championship, and three years later he won the Minnesota State Junior Championship. Latawiec won two State Public Links championships, two Twin Cities Amateurs, and with partner Gene Hanson, the inaugural MGA Four-Ball Championship (1960). During an extraordinary 18-year stretch (1950 and 1972), he played in 17 U.S. Amateur Public Links championships.
After service in WWII Latawiec founded Chet's Shoes (there are now three Chet's Shoe Stores). He always believed that there should be something at stake whenever he was on the course, and one of his mottos was: "You play or you pay."
McGuire, of St. Paul, is the former head golf professional at the Phalen Golf Course, who retired in 2010 after serving for 28 years. She has earned numerous honors during that time including the Minnesota PGA Section’s Bill Strausbaugh Award – twice, in 2002 and 2009; the Minnesota PGA Section’s Facility Promoter of the Year, in 2001; the LPGA Midwest Section Professional of the Year, in 1994; the LPGA’s National President’s Award – also twice, in 1995 and 1999; and she was inducted into the Minnesota Golf Hall of Fame in 2011.
McGuire, who got her start in the golf business as a caddie at St. Paul’s Town & Country Club, dedicated her life to serving the game, especially women and junior golfers. She has given countless hours to the LPGA-USGA Girls Golf program and charity golf events, including the Tapemark Charity Pro-Am and the Komen Foundation (Breast Cancer), as well as serving as host and co-chair of the HOPE Golf Classic, helping to raise thousands of dollars in the fight against breast cancer.
