Mount Dad chips in for Teepot
Keith Caldarera now officially qualifies as a member of the Mount St. Mary Academy Dads Club.
His daughter, Josie, is a freshman at the all-girls Catholic school in Little Rock’s Hillcrest Neighborhood.
Caldarera, general manager of Riverside Acura/Subaru, and his wife, Allison, are co-vice-chairmen of the TeePot Golf Classic, an annual tournament that the Dads Club and the Mount St. Mary Academy Athletic Booster Club put on to raise money for scholarships and to support the school’s athletic and other extracurricular programs.
The event, by the way, is marking its 10th anniversary on 10/10 — that’s Friday, at the Country Club of Arkansas, 3 Country Club Circle, Maumelle.
Golfers can choose one of two
flights, 8 a.m. and 1 p.m. It’s $500 to register a four-person team, which includes lunch and special tee gifts for each player, $100 for a single player. The tournament is still accepting sponsors. Call (501) 664-8806, email Marilyn Lenggenhager at mlenggenhager@mtstmary.edu or visit mtstmary.edu.
“TeePot” is a clever way of tying a golf-based event to the teapot that symbolizes the Mercy Values of the Sisters of Mercy who founded the school.
Caldarera describes himself as a “struggling golfer,” who mostly plays on “all of the area’s finer public courses.” He’s on one of the four-golfer teams that will be teeing off in the afternoon flight.
His dealership is one of the sponsors; another dealer, Gwatney Chevrolet, provides a 2014 Chevrolet Camaro for anybody who scores a hole in one (Paul Chaplin won a Chevrolet Colorado truck for acing the 158-yard 15th hole with a 7-iron at the fifth annual TeePot Golf Classic in 2009).
There are also prizes for Closest to the Pin and Longest Drive, among other accomplishments, as well as prize drawings for a $500 Best Buy gift card, a $250 cologne gift basket from Dillard’s at Park Plaza, a new TaylorMade driver, a Nike golf bag, Smith Optics sunglasses, a man’s designer watch from Swaffar Jewelers of North Little Rock and a variety of gift cards to local stores and restaurants.
Although it’s his first year as a Mount Dad, it’s Caldarera’s fourth year to be involved with the TeePot Classic.
“I’m a Catholic High alumus, and I’ve been chairman of the Catholic High tournament for a number of years,” he says. “I am now expanding my allegiance.”
As vice chairman and chairman-elect, Caldarera has been standing in for chairmen Brian and Jennifer Loeb (their older daughter, Taylor, is a junior at the school and reportedly quite a golfer) to gain the tournament a little publicity.
Caldarera will be in charge of next year’s event, which means starting 10 months out to get it organized. In that, he’ll have the help of a big group of Mount Dads, but also Mount alumnae, parents and family.
Caldarera says event organizers are hoping to pull in $50,000 this year through sponsorships and entry fees, topping the $40,000 they raised last year.
The money goes to fund a varying number of full need-based scholarships — currently, four students are benefiting from two separate scholarship funds — and to buy uniforms for “a variety of activities,” Caldarera says, including the school’s 16 athletic teams but also the band and other groups.
Any father of a student is eligible to join; Caldarera says some dads of alumnae are still showing up to help out.
The group has an event every other month, and also does a number of other things for the school under the radar — pitching in to do a little landscaping (“We’re workhorses,” Caldarera says proudly), providing lunch for a father-daughter Mass and sponsoring (and cooking the burgers for) a back-to-school night for parents and a senior basketball night cook-out.
The club’s activities serve to help keep tuition costs down, but its primary function, Caldarera explains, is to strengthen the bond between the students and their male parents. (The Catholic High Rocket Moms, a support group for all-male Catholic High School, serves a similar function, Caldarera says.)
“It’s an all-girls school and it’s easy for them to become immersed” in an all-female environment, he says. “This is a way for these dads to be more active and present in their daughters’ lives year-round.”
Carolee and Grady Hopf of Little Rock will celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary with a trip to South Dakota. The couple were married Oct. 5, 1964. She is the former Carolee Carrington and a retired florist. He is retired from Yellow Freight. They are the parents of Patricia Davis of Bryant, Grady Hopf Jr. of Little Rock and John Carrington of Meckling, S.D. The couple have four grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.
Judy and Doyle Herndon of Sherwood celebrated their 50th anniversary in June with a family trip to Destin, Fla. They also plan a cruise. The couple were married Oct. 5, 1964. He retired from the Army and state government. They are the parents of Mark Herndon of Chesterville, Va.; Kim Bigelow of Huntsville, Ala.; Eric Herndon of North Little Rock; and Becky Wooten of Russellville. The couple have 18 grandchildren.