Disc Golfing Brings a Gainesville Family Together

I want to tell you a story about the Gurthie family. Not because they are rich or famous. In fact, they don't have much money and barely anybody has ever heard of them. But people like the Gurthies remind us that sometimes, sports can take on a deeper meaning.

That is exactly what the unusual sport of disc golf did when it brought the Gurthies through some of the worst tragedies that can happen to a family. Now, with 17-year-old Garrett as one of the top-ranked disc golfers in the nation, the Gurthie family is getting a little more attention. But an article in the newspaper or some tournament money does not compare to what the family has already been through. And through the sport of disc golf, they have been able to move forward.

Garrett's climb to the top of disc golf in the U.S. started with his father, Howard. Howard used to love throwing Frisbees at the beach and was told by a friend that he should give the sport of disc golf a try. Shortly thereafter, he was shipped off to the Navy and lost touch with it. Then, in his first night back to Gainesville, he took a girl to the parking lot of Northside Park so they could be alone. Little did he know that girl, Ruth, would become his wife and the mother of his five children. Also surprising to him was the fact that Northside Park was the site of the only disc golf course in the area.

“There's that game I heard about," he said when he met Ruth the next day and saw several people trying to throw multicolored discs into chain-linked baskets.

Eventually, Howard, would become so captivated by the sport, he would introduce every one of his kids to it. And the fact that he lived a few feet from the park didn't hurt either.

“It got to a point where my kids grew up biting Frisbees,” he said. “They were teething on it.”

Then with his fourth son, Garrett, Howard had his prodigy. But at one point, that prodigy came very close to losing his avenue for success when the city thought of tearing down Northside Park and replacing it with a Wal-Mart. Little did the Gurthie family know that the worst tragedy they had suffered up to then would eventually be their saving grace.

Years before developers thought about tearing down the park, Garrett's grandfather became paralyzed when a homeless man whom he let stay the night at his house  beat him repeatedly over the head with an aluminum bat. Later, in an act of remembrance, Howard took his dad's ashes and spread them among the Magnolia trees in the middle of the course so, as he said, "he could watch his grandkids grow up."

Fast forward to a few years later and Howard was at the city council meetings ranting about how his family is literally embedded in the park, and there is no way they can take that away from him.

"You're going to put pavement over my dad's ashes?" he asked city council.
Eventually, with the help of Howard and many others who rallied around him, they didn't, and Wal-Mart was built instead a few miles north of the park.

But the Gurthies would face another setback. On June 30, 2005, Ruth died of a massive heart attack, one day before Howard's only daughter, Victoria, turned 13.

Garrett figured that with his Dad having to provide for five kids as a single parent who makes minimum wage, his skill of throwing a disc could help his family.

So Garrett hit the tournament scene again and dominated like never before. In 2006, he brought in $6,500, and this year, he's already made close to $4,000.

What does he do with that money? He helps his father buy groceries and with that, Howard is able to keep his family afloat in the wake of a major tragedy.

So, the same park that serves as the place Howard met his future wife and the holder of his father's ashes now serves as the avenue for his son to help the family through his gift of playing disc golf.

That is what sports are supposed to represent.

"We may not be very rich," Howard said. "But we're rich at heart"

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