One of the area’s best-run charity golf tournaments was held at Scotch Valley Country Club – The Village at Morrison’s Cove Challenge – last
Friday. Unfortunately, this year’s tournament was played without its founding member and one of the area’s golfing giants – Wes Lingenfelter. “Knowing Wes the way I do,” his wife, Shirley, said, “I know he was smiling down on us today.” In February, Lingenfelter unexpectedly succumbed to the effects of a stroke at the age of 75 after establishing himself in the local community as a successful businessman, athlete and family man. Lingenfelter excelled in many sports as a young man while attending Roaring Spring High School, especially baseball. He was good enough to earn tryouts with the Pittsburgh Pirates. After much consideration, however, Lingenfelter decided his future would be better served by returning home to attend college and to raise a family with Shirley, whom he first met in the eighth grade. After excelling in baseball, football and basketball during his days at Juniata College, Lingenfelter began a long, successful career for New Enterprise Stone and Lime Company. According to Shirley, it wasn’t until the late 1950s that her husband first tried golf.
“He was such an active baseball player,” she said. “He felt that golf might be a sport that he could apply some of the skills he had learned from the other sports he had played. He played a few rounds at Park Hills in Altoona and became hooked on the game.”