After 15 years, the Kiwanis Club of Tellico Village’s annual fundraising golf tournament is running as smooth as ever.

“It’s running like a Swiss watch,” club vice president and programs coordinator Fred Wicht said. “Things just work. We’ve got a great team. This is the 15th golf tournament. So we’ve had 15 of these.”

It’s the time and work that Kiwanis members put into organizing the tournament that is the reason things have gone so smoothly now for years, club officials said.


“I do know that probably 80 percent of our members, which is a membership of close to 100, are involved in it in some way,” Wicht said. “How many volunteer hours, I don’t know, but I do know that it encompasses a large majority of our members.”

The tournament maxed out its 112-player cap, and Wicht said the community response toward Kiwanis has been enthusiastic for numerous years.

“We normally have a full house,” he said. “It’s a tournament that’s well attended. People know it well and know how much Kiwanis has done for the community so they’re willing to support it, and we have great attendance.”

At the end of the tournament, the club presented two AmTrykes, which is a therapeutic tricycle that is prescribed by physical therapists to children with disabilities. Those were presented to Bailey Peters, 14, and Zachary Pendley, 12.

“It was just amazing,” Melissa Peters, Bailey’s mother, said. “My daughter is loving her bike and would never had, had that opportunity without them.”

Getting the bike is something special    for the families who haven’t had the opportunity to provide that experience to their children before, parents said. That was the case for Zachary’s mother, Cynthia Pendley.

“It’s been a dream of ours to have Zach be able to ride a bike, and it just, with his disabilities, was not a possibility,” she said. “So it was just definitely a dream come true for all of us. And when we got home that night, even after all the photography, he still wanted to ride his bike. I just feel like they answered the prayers of a lot of families.”

Wicht said it’s important to give those participating in the tournament a chance to see first-hand where the funds are going.

“One of the things that we want people to know is that we’re good stewards of money that’s being donated,” Wicht said. “We do a lot of things in the community.”

The response from those in attendance of the tournament to either play or volunteer was tremendous for the families as well, club officials said.

“It was really heartwarming,” Pendley said. “So many people came up to us and said, ‘Hi,’ to Zach and were very encouraging and seemed like they were all just there for a purpose and excited to be there and excited to give Zach and Bailey their bikes. Just really good people.”

After everything wrapped up, Ray Scott, Kiwanis publicity chairman, had nothing but good words to say about how it all fell together.

“It was the most successful golf tournament ever,” he said.