By Alex Podlogar
On his most recent trip to Pinehurst, Chris, also known fondly by as friends as “Goose,” didn’t play golf. He didn’t eat, and he didn’t sleep.
He didn’t even sit down. Not once. And his flight home was cramped and miserable.
It was the most meaningful visit of his life.
A year ago, Goose and seven good friends, including some of his closest pals, Mike Stanton and Colin Fitzgerald, visited Pinehurst. Upon returning home, they immediately booked another trip for this fall season. “We knew we had to go back,” Stanton says.
“We had an unbelievable weekend and just fell in love with the place,” he adds. “Immediately, when we came home, we booked for the same eight of us in 2024.”
They all made it back in November. Sort of.
His friends made sure their friend Chris, aka"Goose," would make it to Pinehurst. When they arrived, they found a special ally in The Manor's Kathy Capel.
Six months ago, Goose and his wife Amanda learned she had been diagnosed with cancer. With three young kids at home, the last thing Goose would ever consider was leaving his family behind for any amount of time. He called his friends – some of them go back as far as kindergarten classmates – and gave them the news.
“Listen, these guys are my best friends,” Goose says. “I don’t cry much, but I’ve cried twice to them in the last six months, and that was one of those times.”
The other time? We’ll get to that.
Golf was the furthest thing from anyone in the group’s minds. But, eventually, the realization soon hit – there was a trip already on the books.
“When we got the news about Amanda, that was devastating for everybody,” Stanton says. “And as for the trip, none of us wanted to go without Goose. But he just said, ‘Guys, you have to go.’”
That’s when Colin Fitzgerald had an idea.
"Goose" greets guests at The Manor.
“We’re all kind of connected to a different charity one way or another,” Fitzgerald says of the group of friends, most of whom hail from the Philadelphia area. Some have their own foundations that are based on family causes like breast cancer awareness, heart disease and local scholarship benefits. “Charity and nonprofits are a very common theme among all of our friends,” Fitzgerald adds.
So, how could a trip to Pinehurst to play golf actually help people like Goose and Amanda?
Easy. A photo, an app, shipping – and the kindness of Kathy Capel.
“I was thinking, ‘How can we make sure he’s definitely a part of the trip?’” Fitzgerald says. “And I just had a stupid idea.”
What Fitzgerald had was a photo of Goose – standing, gesturing and enjoying a beverage. He found a website where he could upload the photo, and they would ship a life-size cardboard cutout. Click. Pay. Send.
Ship to Pinehurst.
Capel, who manages the front desk at The Manor, received the package with news of the plan. She smiled to herself upon opening a 6-foot, Flat Stanley-esque 2-dimensional version of “Goose.”.
“I thought to myself, ‘Oh, we’re going to take real good care of him,’” Capel recalls. “He’s still going to experience Pinehurst.”
"Goose" joins his friends at dinner at Pinehurst.
Back in Philly, the group established a GoFundMe page (you can donate if you wish here) to benefit the Colorectal Cancer Alliance. They created a QR code, printed it, and upon their reunion with Cardboard Goose, attached it to him.
“We thought, well, we might generate a lot of interest if we’re carrying around a 6-foot cardboard cutout of our friend at a place like Pinehurst,” Fitzgerald says. “The more you tell the story, you’re going to appeal to the good nature of people, and they might throw in a couple bucks here and there.”
And so they did. Cardboard Goose joined his buds at dinner at the 1895 Grille and at the Carolina Dining Room. He even managed a few pints of Guinness at Dugan’s one night.
But it was Capel who made Cardboard Goose feel right at home.
“I kept him up and around,” Capel says. “The group would play golf, or go to bed, we’d add him to the Manor desk with us, or in the hallway, or at the elevator.
“Look, people go to the North & South Bar and walk this way every night. I thought, if we leave him up, and if we share the story, people and guests will see him.”
"Goose" enjoys a night out at the North & South Bar.
It worked. By the time Stanton and Fitzgerald started checking the GoFundMe site, they started seeing names of people who donated. But while the total kept going up, something didn’t quite add up. They remembered the people they ran into, told the story and saw scan the code and donate.
But there were more donations than meetings.
“There’s half of them I have no clue who they are,” Fitzgerald says.
“We weren’t even around, but Goose was just standing in the hallway,” Stanton says. “We didn’t even talk to some people who had to have walked by and scanned the code to donate. That was all Kathy and Gena (Kruczek) at The Manor.”
“Ain’t that something?” Capel softly says, as a smile creases her cheeks.
"Goose" works the front desk at The Manor.
There were two more people who still needed to hear the story. First, though, Cardboard Goose had to get back home.
“I just kept him in the same box from the order and had shipped it directly to Pinehurst,” Fitzgerald says. “After three days at Pinehurst, I thought, ‘Did I really want to lug this thing back to the airport?’ But I felt a pretty big obligation then and brought him home. I asked, ‘Is this going to work as a carry-on?’ and they said, ‘Oh, no,’ so I checked him.”
Not long after getting back home, the guys paid a visit to Goose and Amanda. That’s when the tears came a second time.
“Obviously, they were sending pictures of me as a cardboard cutout throughout the weekend,” Goose says. “But I hadn’t seen the QR code, so I just thought it was a joke. I didn’t know about it until they got home. They came over to our house, presented the cardboard cutout and told me about all the things they did, but also all the stories about how people would come up to them and donate.”
“It’s hard to comprehend the kindness so many people have in their hearts,” Fitzgerald says. “And here we are walking around and people who have flown in from all over the world are walking up and scanning a QR code and donating – whether we were there with him or not, and all these people certainly don’t know us. That’s pretty special.”
Upon hearing Fitzgerald’s words, Capel smiles warmly.
“Ain’t that something?” she says again. “Ain’t that something?”