Leading Limberlost

GENEVA — Rod Ashman learned to play golf at Golf Club of the Limberlost.
And he had been the PGA Professional there for eight years.
So when he got the opportunity to take a greater stake in the operation, he went for it.
“I’ve been in this business for a long time, and I think you get to the point where you want to be the guy,” said Ashman, now the Director of Golf Operations, on Thursday after playing a few holes in the unseasonably warm weather. “You want to have control of your own destiny … I feel like I have more of that. I have an opportunity to make a lot more money, but also there’s risk … just like in everything. It’s just a challenge.”
As of February Ashman has taken over the business side of the golf club, located at 207 North Drive just east of U.S. 27 in Geneva, while leasing the land from a group of local owners headed by the Briggs family.
“We have other businesses to run,” said Andrew J. Briggs, one of the owners and also the president of Bank of Geneva. “He wanted to lease it. It’s not my primary focus.”
Ashman said he was first approached about the opportunity during the fall, but didn’t take it too seriously at first. However, as the weeks went by he thought about it more and more.
He said there were some sleepless nights as he thought about taking on the risk of having the business on his shoulders, but in the long run it was a chance worth taking.
“It just kind of fell into place,” said Ashman, a Portland resident who serves on the Portland Park Board. “It seemed like a good idea for both parties.
“(The owners) have been very generous over the years. They’ve pumped money into this (course). They’ve made it really nice.”
Lead among those improvements, Ashman said, was the switch from Bluegrass to Bentgrass fairways a few years ago. He noted that the Bentgrass is better at handling Indiana’s ever-changing weather conditions.
In addition to the change in surface, the club also added a driving range.
Ashman said he hopes to increase promotion and bring new players to GCL, previously called Wabash Valley Golf Club, knowing that it is important to draw golfers from outside Adams County to make the business thrive.One of the features he hopes will become a bigger draw are “Premier Memberships”, in which members get credit toward their accounts for brining guests.
“This year one of our members from Coldwater, who was really reluctant to do that at the start, is playing this year for free,” Ashman said. “He put all that credit back toward his membership … and basically all he did was have his friends come and play with him.”
The Portland native and Jay County High School graduate said his biggest challenge thus far is having more responsibility in terms the financial aspect of the club.
“This year, the biggest thing with me is, taking over the business,” he said, noting that he had also had interest in buying Portland Golf Club as well as Donald Ross Golf Club on the south Side of Fort Wayne. “A lot of times in the past I had control of what we spent, but everything went on to an accountant and he kind of handled things on that end. All of that is … on my desk right now.”
Ashman went to Ball State University to become a teacher and did his student teaching at JCHS. But he said after graduation teaching jobs were he short supply, so after working in the summer at Portland Golf Club he became this assistant golf pro at Brookwood Golf Club in Fort Wayne.
He moved to Fairview Golf Club, now Donald Ross, in 1991 and was the head professional there for 10 years before spending three years as the pro at Grey Goose Golf Club in Decatur. He has been at Golf Club of the Limberlost, where his grandfather, Dave, once held the course record, since 2003.
“This is where I learned to play golf with my grandfather and my dad,” Ashman. “So it’s kind of neat to be back here.”[[In-content Ad]]