As an Affiliated Event of The Cup Experience, a record number of Gaslight attendees is expected this year. The Chamber Jeffersontown, who puts on the Gaslight Festival, has partnered with The Cup Experience, the Mayor's Task Force, and the Convention and Visitors Bureau to prepare to welcome this influx of visitors during Ryder Cup week. Ryder Cup fans will enjoy the Gaslight Parade with Grand Marshal, Louisville native and worldwide inspiration, golfer Don Fightmaster.
When it comes to forgetting the past and pressing forward, Louisville’s Don Fightmaster embodies that mantra as well as anyone.
Fightmaster, who at age 22 lost his left arm in an automobile accident while serving in the Air Force, has focused a large portion of his time and energy since then encouraging others of all ages with permanent physical disabilities to move forward with their lives. He has done so primarily through the game of golf.
Fightmaster, affectionately known as “Lefty,” was an international master of one-armed golf for several decades. His long list of championships includes being the two-time international one-armed golf champ and the seven-time national titlist. His most recent international golf championship came in 1992 when he won the International Senior One Arm title in Scotland.
Don has won numerous other golf tournaments and is a member of the Kentucky Golf Hall of Fame, the Amateur Softball Association Hall of Fame and the Kentucky Sports Hall of Fame.
But the accomplishment of which he is most proud is the Don Fightmaster Foundation for Exceptional Children, which he founded in 1979. The organization has contributed more than $1 million to the Louisville community for the purpose of assisting handicapped kids. The foundation also helped fund The Don Fightmaster Playground for Exceptional Children, Kentucky’s first fully accessible playground, located at the University of Louisville’s Cardinal Park. Fightmaster is known for his visits to local hospitals to encourage those who’ve lost a limb or suffered other tragedies. “I tell them what happened to me and what I’ve done,” he says. Also, his annual Fightmaster Golf Outing, held during the Kentucky Derby Festival, has been a big success. It pairs physically or mentally challenged children with local junior golfers for a day of golfing fun. Through the years, Fightmaster has teamed with notable sports figures such as Fuzzy Zoeller, Paul Hornung and Pee Wee Reese to raise money for children with disabilities.
A standout football and baseball player at Louisville Male High School, Fightmaster played two years at Georgetown College on a football scholarship and was offered a minor league baseball contract before joining the Air Force. But while stationed in Germany, he was in an auto accident that cost him his arm in 1954. He spent six months in rehabilitation at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C.
Soon after, as a student at Indiana University working on his master’s degree in education administration, he was challenged to a golf match by a Louisville friend, Dr. Ed Vermillion. “I had never played golf in my life, but Ed said he’d give me three shots a hole,” said Fightmaster. “I figured I could play with Ben Hogan if he gave me three shots a hole. I shot a 136 that day, and pretty soon I was giving Ed five shots a side!”
Since the accident, Fightmaster, a retired city and state recreation administrator, excelled in a lot of sports, including billiards, steadying the cue stick between his toes; basketball; badminton; softball; swimming; and bowling; and has been a well-known ambassador of one-armed golf and an inspiration to many.
The good-natured Fightmaster delights friends when asked how far he missed a putt. Holding up his one hand, he says, “About this far.”
He is married to the former Barkley Beard, a retired high school guidance counselor originally from Campbellsville, Kentucky.
