In an article in the Telegram & Gazette, Julia McCarthy ’15 remarked on her experience as keynote speaker at the recent Francis Ouimet Scholarship Fund’s Centennial Gala, the highlight event of The Ouimet Fund, which helps young men and women who have worked at golf course in Massachusetts obtain a college education.
Working as a golf caddy at Green Hill Municipal Golf Course in Worcester, Mass., since seventh grade, McCarthy, an English and theatre major from Worcester, is a recipient of the Ouimet Scholarship, and in her speech addressed the personal significance of both caddying and the scholarship.
Delivering the speech in front of over 2,000 gala attendees, including notable guests such as Arnold Palmer and Rich Lerner, she said, “I did not come to love golf so naturally, I first came to golf in order to help out my family,” as she is one of 11 children, and worked to support them. However, she noted, “Money was not the thing that kept me coming back year after year. Every time I was on that golf course I felt at peace. I felt reassured because in every single golfer that I came across…I had found a renewed faith in manners, a renewed faith in people.”
Eventually, she applied for and then received the Ouimet Scholarship. Nodding to both the scholarship fund, her mentors on the golf course and her family, she said, “Without them, I would not be at a college so reputable and prestigious as the College of the Holy Cross.” Then, thinking ahead, she continued, saying, “I wouldn’t have a future ripe with so many possibilities and opportunity.”
This ‘Holy Cross in the News’ story by David Cotrone ’13.
