This former Colonial golf champion helps Lockheed Martin make military care packages
For the third straight year, dozens of Lockheed Martin employees are gathering at Colonial Country Club during the week of the Charles Schwab Challenge to assemble care packages for the military.
And this year, the company — which employs about 20,000 people at its Fort Worth fighter jet assembly plant and its Grand Prairie missile and fire control plant — was joined by 1987 Colonial champion Keith Clearwater.
The group gathered at a “Heroes Tent” along the 17th fairway and put together 600 packages that included Frito-Lay snacks, sanitizer bottles and personalized messages from Lockheed Martin employees as well as some of the golfers taking part in the tournament.
Clearwater, who shot a pair of 64s to win the 1987 event, says he will play in this year’s tournament.
The first round is scheduled to get underway Thursday.
“For those of you who will lay down their life ... and preserve those freedoms for us, and allow us to play a silly game of golf, what a privilege. What an amazing thing. I love being out here,” Clearwater said while assembling care packages for the troops.
Because Clearwater won before 2000, he has a lifetime eligibility to play in the Colonial tournament, and he shows up almost every year. Players who won in 2000 and subsequent years only get a five-year exemption to play in the tournament.
The care packages will be sent to Fort Bragg, N.C., where they will be placed on pallets and sent to troops on dangerous overseas missions, Lockheed Martin spokeswoman Susan Wright said.
This story was originally published May 22, 2019 at 1:34 PM.
