The old collier golf club: a golfer comes home.

Jack Sullivan, at his core, is a golfer's golfer. It was one of the joys of Sullivan's lilt, when he had the opportunity to introduce his then l0-year-old son John--who today is a food and beverage manager for Ritz-Carlton--to Gene Sarazen at the PGA tournament.

It was therefore one of the supreme ironies of Jack Sullivan's life that he spent 15 years managing a club with no golf course. He was very good at it. As manager of the Grosse Pointe Yacht Club, John R. Sullivan, CCM was Club Management Manager of the Year (2000), McMahon Group Award of Excellence in Club Management winner (2000), and manager of a Sibbald Associates Platinum Club (multiple years). He also served as national president of CMAA (1992).

At Grosse Pointe, Sullivan became an avid sailor. His family loved the club and the community. It was a job he could have easily retired from. But something was missing. That something was golf.

Today, Sullivan manages The Old Collier Golf Club, a club that is a golfer's paradise. It's a place where course architect Tom Fazio lovingly respected the environment, where most bags are toted by single-bag caddies recruited from golf shrines like St. Andrews, Carnoustie, Kings Barns, Turnberry, and Whistling Straits. The club is located in coastal Southwest Florida, where Sullivan and his wife Darcy can indulge their love of scuba diving and kayaking year-round. The club grounds are abundant with the wildlife that Sullivan dearly loves.

Instead of reporting to the usual board of directors and committees, he's the general manager and vice president leading a team of seasoned professionals at a club founded by Collier Enterprises.

Streetcar to Fame

Barron Gift Collier was one of the legends of Florida real estate. A wealthy individual through his streetcar advertising business by the age of 38, Barron Collier began amassing property in southwest Florida, eventually acquiring a total of 1.3 million acres, making him Florida's largest landowner.

Barron's sons--Barron, Jr., Miles, and Sam--continued their father's interest in business and real estate. Miles, intensely interested in the conservation of the Southwest Florida land, native plants, and animals, guided family donations of huge tracts of land to the state and federal governments, as well as to ecological organizations.

Barron Gift Collier's vision was to make Southwest Florida a place "where people will come to enjoy life." That vision has continued through the third generation of his family, prompting Miles C. Collier, grandson of Barron and initial managing partner of Collier Enterprises, to set aside 267 acres along the Cocohatchee River in what is now North Naples for The Old Collier Golf Club.

"Low Country in Naples"

From the beginning there was a clear idea of what The Old Collier would be: "The club is meant to feel like someone's home," Sullivan said. "If you walked into the club you would think it had been there for 200 years, even though the clubhouse is just four years old."

Designed by the Connecticut architectural firm Shope Reno Wharton, The Old Collier "Main House" (clubhouse) is a "Low Country" plantation house constructed of handmade Old Carolina brick with a pillared veranda that looks like it has been in place for generations. The roof is slate and the sidewalks surrounding the building are bluestone. Windows are cased in mahogany. "Our goal was timelessness with traditional detailing, as if the clubhouse were built 200 years ago as a residence and adapted for its present use" project architect Jerry Hupy said.

Ceilings are high to keep the heat aloft, and the kitchen is separated from the main building by an enclosed building to keep the main house cool, as it would have been in the days before air conditioning.

Interiors designed by Amelia Handegan of Charleston, SC complete the vision. The scale is personal, evoking the comfortable elegance of a country home. Antique oak plank floors are graced with oriental and sisal rugs. Poplar crown and baseboard moldings and wainscoting complement crystal chandeliers and silvered mirrors. A pastel palette of sages and golds create a restful backdrop for comfortable antique furnishings from Scotland, Holland, France, England, and America. As examples, the center table in the front hall is Portuguese colonial while the chairs and sideboard are 1830s American.

Locker rooms carry through the gracefully-aged feel. Handcrafted wooden lockers are juxtaposed with fine furnishings such as an antique English sideboard and an 18th-century cupboard. Walls in the ladies' card room are upholstered in custom, hand-printed linen. A relaxed ambience creates a preferred locale for lounging and lunching. The club's emphasis on the natural environment is reflected in such touches as palm trees painted on muslin and hung as wallpaper.

Gator Playing Through The Old Collier site brought a smile to golf course architect Tom Fazio's face. Fazio realized immediately that the objective was to take advantage of the site's natural terrain and to expose golfers to the region's fauna and flora.

"The concept and commitment underlying The Old Collier Golf Club is not to create a country club or a residential community, but rather a unique and special club dedicated to the game of golf," Fazio said. "The design of the golf course reflects this priority and creates a special golf environment that is not compromised in any way. The design integrates shot values, playability, aesthetics, and conditioning amid a magnificent natural environment, creating an experience that golfers of all skill levels will enjoy day in and day out."

Enhancing that golf experience is Old Collier's single-bag caddy pro gram. "Our caddy master is from Carnoustie. Four of our caddies carried bags at the last British Open," Sullivan said. "A caddy is not just someone to carry a bag. A good caddy will know you well by the 18th hole." Caddies are required prior to 11 a.m., and 68 percent of the rounds played at the club are caddy rounds.

There are no tee times. Sullivan expects that the club's 160 members and their guests will play about 10,000 rounds this year. "We are about golf, golf, and more golf," Sullivan said. There are no homes on the course, no pool, no tennis court.

In keeping with the philosophy of Collier Enterprises and The Old Collier's location amid nature preserves along the Cocahatchee River, an environmentally-respectful approach to the golf course was dictated. Only 77 acres of the site are planted in turf, while over 100 acres of mangrove and wetland habitat were preserved.

The result has been a substantial increase in wildlife since the completion of the course. In excess of 100 species of birds, including eagles, plus bobcats, foxes, otters, and gopher tortoises now live at The Old Collier. Alligators are also residents, but unlike other Florida clubs, no effort is made to remove them as they are intertwined with the environment, which is home to a golf course and nature alike. Sullivan tells of chasing an eight-footer off the course to a nearby pond (he was in a golf cart) only to find that the alligator was annoyed because he was being chased away from his home pond.

Substantial challenges to environmentally-friendly planning existed, including the unavailability of fresh water for irrigation. A water use plan was developed in cooperation with Audubon International and regulatory agencies. The turf on the golf course is a new salt-tolerant turf grass called Seashore Paspalum. The Old Collier was the first course in the continental United States to use the newest varieties of this grass tee to green. The use of 100 percent salt-tolerant plants allows the course to be irrigated with brackish water.

Other efforts include special practices regarding pesticide, fertilizer, recycling, heating and cooling, lighting, energy management, and cleaning of equipment. As a result of the various environmental initiatives, The Old Collier Golf Club has won numerous environmental awards, including having been named as the world's first Audubon International Gold Signature Sanctuary. The course has since also received Audubon's Three Diamonds designation--the "grand slam" of Audubon awards--indicating the highest level of planning, stewardship, and preservation and improvement of the environment for animals, habitat, and man.

From Greens Mower to Toque

While The Old Collier Golf Club will never aspire to be a social club, Sullivan is determined that every experience will be memorable for members and their guests. Members have transponders mounted on their windshields that automatically open the gates and announce their presence--by name--to the staff. Most members of Old Collier belong to other clubs in Naples, as well at their northern residence.

The club will not host charity events or professional tournaments, Sullivan said. Since opening in 2001 it has hosted annual men's and ladies' member/guest tournaments and other member and guest events. However, the main emphasis is placed on the members' ability to play the golf course whenever they desire.

The club dining room is open for breakfast and lunch every day and for dinner on Saturday nights in season. "We have seating for 40 in our dining room and that's the maximum number of reservations we'll take," Sullivan said. "When you book a table, it's yours for the evening." The club also hosts wine dinners and informal cocktail parties for the members and their guests. Members may also host private dinner parties in the club, which truly feels like someone's home.

Sullivan literally found The Old Collier's chef on the club's golf course. Chef Chris Jones, whose background includes interning at the French Laundry and being invited to cook at the James Beard House, was the executive chef and food and beverage director at the Nicklaus North Golf Resort in Canada before he followed his wife's hotel career to Florida. While looking for another culinary position in Naples, he had taken a job at The Old Collier as a greens mower. The club's veteran superintendent, Tim Hiers, mentioned to Sullivan that he had someone on his crew "who can cook." Sullivan took one look at the resume and knew he had a chef.

Jack Sullivan's next project for Collier Enterprises is assisting with the building of a yacht club and marina on Naples Bay called Hamilton Harbor Yacht Club. When the yacht club is built, Sullivan's saga will have come full circle to include his three favorite things--golf, nature, and the water.

One of Jack Sullivan's favorite stories from The Old Collier is about the time he took a prospective member out to play. As they teed near a pond, an osprey flew down and plucked a fish from the pond. An eagle attacked the osprey. More ospreys flew in and attacked the eagle.

"Can we just stop and watch this for a bit?" the prospect asked.