Many of the former soldiers came in wheelchairs, bundled up in blankets, sweatshirts and jackets. It’s still relatively cool this time of year near Seattle, Wash., and the sun wasn’t around to warm things up.

While the sun didn’t do much to brighten the day, five Champions Tour players did their best to add a little light and excitement to the lives of hundreds of veterans on Tuesday.

Ed Dougherty, Jim Thorpe, Dana Quigley, Lonnie Nielsen and Allen Doyle gave a two-hour exhibition at the Veteran’s Administration Hospital then conducted a clinic at the nine-hole Fort Lewis golf course.

Quigley, who holds the Champions Tour record for consecutive tournaments played, doesn’t like to take much time off. However, even he didn’t mind missing some quality practice time before the Boeing Greater Seattle Classic to make the memorable trip.

“The day went fantastic,” Quigley said. “The people that we were dealing with, it just really lit up their day. If I can do that for someone else, it’s an awesome feeling.”

For Dougherty, the day also went extremely well and was considered a huge success.

Allen Doyle interacts with a soldier at Fort Lewis golf course. (Jim Anderson/Boeing Photos)

“We had the five professionals … and the Tour Chaplain Tom Randle as the public address announcer and every one of these guys were outstanding,” Dougherty said. “The clinic went better than I had hoped for. We had four dozen hats from PING, two dozen from Titleist, two dozen from Adams Golf and a couple dozen cigars and we passed them all out.

“We were short in the sense that there were more people there than I had hoped for, so that was a thrill.”

They ran out of gifts because over 300 people came out at the VA Hospital and nearly 100 more attended the clinic at the Fort Lewis course. The event was especially meaningful for Dougherty because he began to play golf seriously while stationed at Fort Lewis after returning from duty in Vietnam in 1969. At the age of 21, only two years after he started playing golf, Dougherty was paying just five dollars a month to play there and develop his game.

He was thrilled to return to the course this week while in town for the Champions Tour tournament at the TPC Snoqualmie Ridge in nearby Snoqualmie, Wash. In fact, it was his idea to come in the first place. At the JELD-WEN Tradition in 2005, Dougherty was summoned as he walked off the putting green to speak to a uniformed soldier who was part of the closing ceremonies.

“Someone said, ‘Dougherty was in Vietnam, get him over here,’” he explained. “So I went over and said hi and congratulations on being back and everything. I told him I was in Vietnam and just so happened to say I was in Fort Lewis.”

Jim Thorpe during a clinic at Ft. Lewis. (Jim Anderson/Boeing Photos)

At that time, Loren Roberts and Dana Quigley were in a playoff, so Dougherty went to wait in the family room. It was there that he met retired General Chuck Gorden, the father of the soldier he had acknowledged earlier.

After the two discussed golf handicaps and being stationed at Fort Lewis, Dougherty offered his help if needed in the future.

“I said, ‘I’ll tell you what. You being the General and this being the army, where there are no rules for the ruler, you get a golf clinic set up and I’ll ensure Quigley, Thorpe and Doyle will come over and conduct an exhibition,’” Dougherty said.

True to his word, he rounded up the professional golf troops, whom he said were his four best friends on the Champions Tour, and Gorden took care of the rest.

For Quigley, he was just happy that he was asked to be part of the group.

“It was unbelievable,” he said. “As I told the people there, if someone had told me a few years ago that I would make someone’s day to go out there and cheer them up, I wouldn’t have believed it. It was just an awesome experience, to make these people feel good about themselves.”

The Tour members may have taken the time to bring a little sunshine and golf to the veterans and soldiers but, in return, they found their own lives enlightened by the experience.