Shoot his age? Well, of course, he can
As he turns 84, Falls golfer is as competitive as ever amid memories of combat during WWII
NIAGARA FALLS — Jim Vaccarella has always had a knack for earning badges of honor.
He’s a war hero who has earned his share of combat medals — including a Purple Heart and French Medal of Honor. The World War II veteran is one of many soldiers responsible for making sure Americans still have the right to celebrate Independence Day weekend.
He’s an accomplished family man, first raising three children with his wife, Margaret, and then taking care of his bride for the final 22 years of her life after an assortment of health ailments left her dependent on others until her death last January.
He’s quite the athlete, once running the 100-meter dash in 10.6 seconds. In addition to boxing in the Army, he was a semiprofessional football player, and played baseball in the old Niagara Falls Industrial League.
Even though the Niagara Falls School District Athletics Hall of Famer turns 84 on Monday, he’ll likely have an easier time achieving feats of athleticism on the golf course that are beyond a lot of people half his age.
Every year since his 77th birthday, Vaccarella has been able to shoot his age at least once a year during an 18- hole round at Hyde Park Golf Course.
The retired bricklayer — with seven grandchildren and two career holes-in-one — shot his age six times last year and in June fired an 82 during a men’s club tournament at Hyde Park.
“My son used to ask me, ‘What’s the big deal about shooting your age?’ ” said Vaccarella, a 17-handicap player who shot an 85 prior to chatting with The Buffalo News. “I said go shoot your age, 52, . . . for 18 [holes]. . . . It’s not that easy.”
Top-flight professional golfers, in their prime, tend to shoot in the 60s and 70s for 18 holes during tournaments. Only a handful of professionals — a list that includes Sam Snead and Arnold Palmer — have fired their age or better in competition.
That’s why shooting your age in golf is a badge of honor for amateurs.
Heck, there are plenty of golfers younger than 55 who would be thrilled to shoot Vaccarella’s age.
“A lot of guys — and I’m one of them — would be happy if we could walk at 82, let alone walk and shoot your age,” said 63- year-old Bill Evans, the Hyde Park men’s golf club president who regularly shoots rounds with Vaccarella. “If I could shoot 82 when I’m 82, I’d be tickled pink. I think it’s probably 1 to 2 percent of the people playing golf in the nation can shoot their age. . . . He’s in great shape.”
Vaccarella started playing golf when he was 12. His handicap figures drop to 14 or 15 with his next low-to mid-80s round. He keeps in shape by working out on a treadmill and lifting weights at his home in the Town of Niagara.
On the golf course, he isn’t the biggest hitter. A drive of 210 yards is cause for celebration. But he hits the ball consistently straight and, if he’s sinking putts. . . . “I can kill them,” said Vaccarella, who won the Hyde Park men’s Club B Flight low-net (actual stroke score minus handicap) title in 2000 — losing the low-gross championship by a stroke to Evans.
As impressive as Vaccarella’s modern-day physical feats are, perhaps his biggest accomplishment is surviving 18 months on the World War II battlefront as a combat medic dodging bullets and shrapnel. He survived to come home to Niagara County and start a family, play a role in the formation of the present Cayuga Babe Ruth youth baseball organization and battle his buddies and his own inner demons on the golf course at least five days a week.
Drafted at age 19, Vaccarella missed D-Day by 21 days, but he was in the middle of everything during the Battle of the Bulge.
There were times when medics such as Vaccarella took more of a beating than the wounded they rescued from the battlefield. And, unlike their German counterparts, U. S. medics didn’t carry guns.
“I was in all of these battles. I guess it wasn’t meant for me to die,” Vaccarella said of how he survived the war while being officially wounded just once. “I was in a battle where they stopped . . . and picked up the wounded. The Germans picked up their wounded. We picked up our wounded and we started all over again.”
During the war, Vaccarella served under famed Army Gen. George S. Patton Jr., including in the Third Army during the Battle of the Bulge.
Vaccarella recalled an incident in which troops had to cross a 30-foot-wide river with a swirling current as strong as the mighty Niagara while holding a rope to make sure they didn’t drown. Soldiers were falling in and became afraid to attempt a crossing. Patton, 59, motivated troops by strapping on a backpack with a rifle and crossing the river. Once reaching the other side, Patton colorfully ordered the rest of the company to do the same.
“He went over and pointed and he swore,” Vaccarella recalled. “He was all, ‘You sons [of guns], get your [butts] over or I’ll make sure you’re demoted.’ ”
Evans said, “I feel really kind of honored to have a friend like that who could tell you how things were back then. I think it’s lost on some of the younger generations of today to understand really how difficult it was back then for all of these young men and women to deal with.”
“When they went over there, no one knew how long . . . they’d be over there. Simply, there was no way to quantify that. They were there until it was over.”
So does Vaccarella’s war experiences make whatever difficulties he encounters on the golf course seem trivial?
Let’s just say he’s a golfer with a competitive drive fueled by growing up in a tough Niagara Falls neighborhood with 16 siblings.
“If I’m playing bad it gets to me,” said Vaccarella, who is motivated by the desire to earn the right to talk trash to his younger playing partners.
“The next thing you know,” Evans said, “he shoots 85 and the next day 83 or 84.”
Vaccarella, whose mother died when she was 101, is determined to play into his 90s.
“I’m just in good physical health,” he said. “I’m lucky I have good genes.”
