Perry the Kentucky Hero Taps Into His Roots

It is hard to envisage anything topping the level of home support Darren Clarke received in Ireland's Ryder Cup two years ago but Kentuckians will be at their boisterous best when one of their own, Kenny Perry, steps on to the first tee tomorrow morning. Despite being a multimillionaire, Perry, who is expected to partner his fellow Kentuckian JB Holmes in the opening match, shares the same values as others from his home state: friendliness, generosity and a love of golf. It is why he built his home town a subsidized course on which to play.

Before Perry's emergence Franklin, a small town of 8,000 people nestled in the hills of south Kentucky, was most famed for hosting the wedding of Johnny Cash and June Carter in 1968. It was in the same year that Kenny Perry Sr, whose own father was the town's mayor, bought his son his first set of golf clubs at the age of eight, a bag which now hangs proudly alongside those of Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup vintage in the clubhouse of Kenny Perry's Country Creek Golf Course. "They're rather tatty now and people can't believe he used those for five or six years," says Perry Sr, known by the club's 50 members simply as Mr Perry.

The 85-year-old second world war veteran can be found at the course every morning picking up balls from the driving range, and his daughter Lydia works in the pro shop, one of 11 staff employed by her brother, who is of course the club's inadvertent star attraction. "Kenny practices on the driving range and putts along with the rest of the guys on the practice green," says the club's director of golf, Greg Nugent. "When the course is busy it can be difficult for him because he always wants to stop and say hello to everyone. He's very accessible and humble."

Perry, who qualified for his second Ryder Cup at the age of 48 by winning three events this year, built the course in 1995 at a cost of $4m [£2.2m] but charges only $28 including buggy hire for the privilege of playing at the beautiful venue. "The reason it's so inexpensive is because Kenny paid for the course himself and all the revenue goes back into its maintenance, not profit," says Nugent. "It was a gift to the community and anyone can come and play. He gives back more than you can imagine but does it behind the scenes and doesn't draw attention to himself."

Nugent tells the tale of how Perry was given $5,000 by one of his church elders so that he could have a third and final crack at PGA Tour qualifying school in 1986, on the condition that should he be successful he would pay a percentage of his subsequent winnings to Lipscomb University, the Christian college in Nashville from which he and his wife graduated. He obtained his tour card and has since donated 5% of his approximately $26m career prize money to the university, or $1.3m.

Similarly his father tells how he donated $125,000 to found a boys' and girls' club in Franklin to provide children with the sort of activities that were never available to him when he was growing up. All the same, Perry Sr was never worried his son might go off the rails through boredom.

"He never smoked, never drank bourbon, never told a dirty joke," Perry Sr says with a strong southern accent and a cigar in his mouth. "I tell him: 'Son, you're just like your mother.' His mother was easy-going and Kenny takes after her.

"It's nice for him still to be in the country here. Here he can let his hair down, relax and talk about golf and old cars, which are his thing. The only times he gets into trouble is with the police over the speed he drives them. But they don't give him a ticket because of who he is."

Tickets are a bone of contention at Country Creek. To boost his player's allocation of 20, Perry bought a further 30 for friends in Franklin for $6,000. When he revealed on Tuesday that he had managed to obtain even more after a request in an interview he gave, "they were gone within five minutes", according to Nugent.

"I took about 100 calls for tickets. Everyone in Franklin has been trying to buy them - it will be a pretty empty town this weekend. They just love Kenny." They will make that apparent tomorrow.