That’s when Rodencal took a summer job at the club that was essentially the equivalent of being the greenskeeper.

Not long after, when the club was able to purchase the necessary land to expand to 18 holes, he was given the task of designing and coordinating the construction of what’s now the front nine — which was finished in 1964.

Rodencal, who’s now 87 and still lives in Prairie du Sac after retiring in 1986, took some time last week to answer a series of questions about that project.

Q: Talk about how it happened that you were asked to design the new nine:

A: I guess, it just happened. I don’t recall anybody actually coming to me and saying, ‘Will you design a nine-hole golf course.’ There were a lot of other people that threw their two-cents worth in, too. On ideas and stuff like that. ... It was a lot of help, because it was probably the cheapest built golf course any place.

On the course itself, I spent $27,000 building it. And that included labor and heavy machinery that we had rented, and stuff like that. Because we had a lot of people in town that contributed labor to help out, like the watering system, Fuchs Prairie Heating and Plumbing put it in for cost. We built the original clubhouse at that time, and the gentleman (that lived near me) was in the state architect’s office, and he contributed his time, he drew a set of plans ... and acted as general contractor for nothing, for a share of stock, a $100 share of stock. That’s what I got for designing the golf course. But as for somebody, like the board of directors, coming to me and saying ‘Will you design a golf course?’ I think it almost happened more or less in conversation. ...

Q: Conceptually, once you started the process of designing the course, what were the main considerations that went into it?

A: I was shooting for a par 36 nine, which meant I had to have two 5s, two 3s and the rest 4s, for pars. And in designing it, you’ve got to take into consideration the flow on the golf course. And another thing is, some golf courses get built by heavy machinery just moving dirt here and moving dirt there and building hills and whatnot. And I tried to design it within the flow of the land.

Now, like you take No. 6 green, I built that green right into the flow of the land. All I did was, take that slope of the land, put my green mix on it and build the aprons around it, and that was it. I didn’t build a base with all the contours in it and all that type of stuff, for that particular green, because the flow of the land right there was perfect for a green. So why not use it? Why bring a piece of machinery in and try and reshape it? And that’s kind of the way I went at, and cut down on the amount of heavy machinery.

Q: So basically it was kind of like putting a puzzle together.

A: I didn’t want to reshape the land, you know what I mean. ... The main part of that was farmland ... (so) we had to take out some trees, and went back up in the hill and took dirt out of the hill and brought it out here to build the approach to the green and stuff like that. I had a guy in there with a bulldozer that was pretty (darn) good. He could move dirt great, and blend it in and whatnot.

Q : What would you say was the biggest challenge, given the considerations you set for yourself?

A: The whole thing (laughs). I had never built a golf course, so I had to learn and what you might say, pick people’s brains. We used to always play a match down at Janesville, in the invitational tournament down there, and after the kids were off the tee, I’d head over for the superintendent’s shack and chew the fat with (Ralph) Christenson, his name was, until we were done. And that’s where I learned a lot. And that little house that’s down by No. 16 green, Art Yngsdal’s father lived in that house. He was the one that built the original course, and then redid it after the war, World War II, and I used to go over and talk with him. And that’s where I learned a lot about going into it.

Q: What’s your best memory of the whole process?

A: I think getting it done. No, I guess I’m proud of the whole project, because let’s face it, those greens now are over 40 years old and they’ve stood up. So many golf courses, after so many years, they’re tearing the surface of the greens up and recontouring them. Of course, I was only out there one day this year, and rode around and looked at stuff, and the greens looked good to me. Everybody that played out there said they were quick, and rolled good and rolled true. I guess I can look back at it now, 44 years later or so, I guess it’s something that I’m leaving on earth. I’m proud of it, and it’ll probably always be there until somebody decides to put a housing development out there (laughs). But I would say, it’s probably not one thing is gratifying, but the whole idea of the accomplishment of designing and building a golf course that has stood the test of time.

Q: When you were designing the course, of the nine holes, was there a hole that you really enjoyed designing?

A: Not necessarily from the design standpoint. The only hole, as I said when I told you (earlier in the series), No. 3 was the only hole that I really had found a hole that matched the land, you might say. And so that was why that hole ended up being, not a complete replica of (a hole at the Golf Courses of Lawsonia in Green Lake), but similar to it.

And I guess some of the holes ... up in the woods, like Nos. 5, 6 and 7, up there in the back, can turn out to be three very challenging holes. Even though No. 6 is only 285 yards long. The pros today would all be driving that hole, but they’d have to keep it out of the trees. That hole, that entire hole, was built just the way the contour of the land was. ... And the two tees back there, we knocked the knobs off on the two hills that were sticking out into the golf course property. We flattened the tops out and made tees on them.

Q: Over the years now, as you’ve had time to reflect, is there a hole that’s become your favorite?

A: (Long pause). I wouldn’t say that I have any particular hole that stands out in my mind. Like I said before, I guess I’m more proud of the whole project, that it turned out like it did. Because at the time that this began, there wasn’t the kind of money type thing, you might say, around. They’ve spent more money (since) on the clubhouse and on doing things out there than we spent on the whole golf course. But what it did was it gave them a nucleus to start with. ...

Q: Did you find yourself, when you’d golf there, kind of rehashing some of the memories of what went into designing it?

A: Not necessarily. The last green that we built, when we rebuilt No. 16 in the summer of ‘86, we had a certified mixture. The USGA had come up with a mixture. We had I don’t know how many semi-loads.

But anyway, we got it all done, the green was there and we had about a yard of mixture leftover. And John Budd was helping, and I said, ‘John, take that yard and mixture, and you can do anything you want with it.’ And he put a — down in the lower end of that green, there’s a very inconspicuous kind of horseshoe-shaped ridge. (Laughs) It gets a lot of people, because you don’t really see it. But if you’re up above, and hit the putt down to the hole, you get some funny little breaks. ...

Q: If you could change anything you did in the process of the design, what would that be?

A: I would have built No. 8 green differently. And the reason I say that is, that green, the righthand side of the green settled out. That was all fill dirt down in there, and so that right edge of the green is really vicious. In other words, to hit a shot into it, and to get it to hold — it’s hard. That ball will take off.

That green should have had a little more tilt in it, front to back, and the right hand edge of it should have been up more. No. 8 fairway, from the corner (of the dogleg) down, was a washed out ravine. That was a natural flow of water down through there. ... And that’s why, if you look at the ground over on the woods side, and on the golf course side you’ll notice there’s quite a slope into it.

And that’s because, that’s where the guy started with the bulldozer. I didn’t expect him the day that he came, and he came and, oh, it was early afternoon and he said ‘Where do you want me to start?’ And I wasn’t really ready for him — I was expecting him later in the week —　so I had to come up with a job for him right now. And there was willows along in that ravine and what have you. I went down there with him and I said, ‘Now, this has all got to be shaped in here, and all this brush has got to come out. You can push that up in a pile out here in the field.’

And that’s where the pond is. We had a pile of trees like nobody’s business there that we eventually burned. So he started way back in that field, and bladed that dirt in, filled in that washout ravine all the way down to the road. And I think that was probably why that side of the green settled more, because it was all fill.

Q: Anything else that you would change about any of the other holes?

A: (Long pause). I probably would have elevated No. 9 a little more, especially to the back side, to the north side of it. Just a little more elevation, so that when you’re out on the fairway, the surface of the green would be a little more visual. Because it’s almost flat to the point where, out on the fairway, you can’t see the base of the pin on it.

If it would have been elevated about a foot more on the back edge, that would have been better.

Q: How much different would it be to design a course now vs. then.

A: The thing is, now you have to design a golf course for 300 (yard) hitters. And the equipment has changed to the point where you’re hitting the ball so far.

On the front side, those two par 5s are only about 500 or just a shade over 500 yards. And today, they’re playing 500 yard holes as par 4s. ... Golf courses today, they’re designing par 3 holes 230 yards and in that range. So you’ve got to have a lot more land where you can stretch the golf courses out.

Q: But you pretty much got the most out of the available space?

A: I got the maximum out of it. The only way we could have gotten any more yardage was if we would have infringed on some of these areas like where the driveway is. Instead of having that driveway there, you go back to the tennis courts. From the tennis courts all the way back there would be a tee, but then you don’t have any parking lot. So you have to consider things like that in it.

After things got changed around — the pro shop originally was downstairs, where the locker room is — when the clubhouse got remodeled and the pro shop came opstairs, that’s why we got two putting greens, because then we had to get a putting green (on the south end of the clubhouse).

Then that was congested there, because that whole side of that, from the putting green down to the road, is where the drain field is, the septic system. And so, there’s not too much room to stretch it out. Like No. 14, that tee could go back probably 30 yards or so. But the reason it’s never gone back is that cotton picken’ steel transmission tower. You’d have balls rattling off that all the time. ...

We’re pretty well cramped in, you might say, into what land that there was.