Golf has always been a part of Don Spieth’s life.
The Muscatine native spent some of his youth caddying at the Muscatine Country Club and playing on the public course next door during his summers, eventually playing for the Muscatine High School golf team before his graduation in 1959.
But music, his life’s passion, eventually overtook his love for golf. He put much of his time toward achieving his life-long goal of being an orchestra conductor, which he has been for nearly the last 40 years in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, including the last six with the Moravian College Community Orchestra, which he started and after taking a 20-year leave.
Spieth has a new reason to enjoy the game — his grandson, Jordan Spieth, the 10th-ranked player in the world who returns to TPC Deere Run in Silvis, Illinois — about 40 miles away from Muscatine — on Thursday to defend a John Deere Classic title he claimed last summer that vaulted the then-19-year-old into unprecedented success on the PGA Tour.
“I got familiar with and fell in love with it,” Don said of playing golf growing up in Muscatine. “Then I went to college and didn’t play. Thirty years later, I realized I go could play four hours on a Sunday and nobody would care. I’ve played once or twice a week for last 15 years. … When Jordan started doing what he’s doing, it piqued the interest even more.”