Clifton Park

Golfers can be, well, overly focused on their games sometimes.If you tell a golfer that there are 24 Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites rotating soundlessly 11,000 miles above the Earth's surface to provide navigational help for this country's military weapons, intelligence community and transportation infrastructure, he or she might nod politely and stifle a yawn.But if you say: "This GPS stuff might help lower your handicap, too," the golfer will clap you on the back and order a round of drinks and shout: "Do we live in a great country or what?

CLIFTON PARK, N.Y. - They built the comfortable, brick-faced house 50 years ago. That was when Waite Road was a rutted ribbon of mud in the spring. That was back when Clifton Park was farmland and forest instead of sprawling, upscale suburbia.Now Harold and Betty Keefner have neighbors - nice, modern houses nearby, many of them home to senior state officials who work in Albany, 20 miles or so to the south. Even newer neighbors live in the woods behind them.Harold Keefner is a tall, trim, white-haired man of 80, a retired carpenter.

Two young men were found shot to death in apparently unrelated incidents in Baltimore early yesterday, city police reported.Sebastian Lamont Clowney, 23, of the 6100 block of Shipview Way, was found dead shortly before 7: 30 a.m. in the rear yard of a house in the 1500 block of Elrino St. in O'Donnell Heights.Detective Lynette Nevins said area residents heard shots at 2: 40 a.m., but police did not find anything amiss at the time.In the other incident, Detective Danny Danzie said officers were questioning a man seen firing a gun shortly past midnight near the 2700 block of Fenwick Ave., near Clifton Park.

A story in yesterday's Today section misidentified a Baltimore golf course. The northeast Baltimore course is the Clifton Park Golf Course.The Sun regrets the error.Beverly Hamilton sidled over to another mom, sensing she wouldn't laugh at her new-to-all-this questions. Where do you buy child-sized golf clubs? How do you know what size to get? What if the kid has a growth spurt? Will we have to get him new clubs every year?"He says he's going to be the next Tiger Woods," Hamilton said with a shake of her head as she watched her son Benjamin, 10, take a lesson at Lake Clifton Golf Course in northeast Baltimore.

A 20-year-old man was arrested yesterday and charged with holding up three golfers at the Clifton Park Golf Course -- a series of robberies that frightened players and prompted heightened police protection on the fairways and greens.City police arrested David Bobby Farmer at his home in the 2000 block of N. Rose St. in East Baltimore and charged him with three counts of armed robbery and using a handgun in the commission of a crime.The armed holdups on the city-owned course "were making everybody nervous," said Maj. Bert L. Shirey, commander of the Northeastern District station.

FOR A LONG time he did not think about it at all and then lately he thought a lot about it. It was about his caddie days and his caddie badge.He had it still, the caddie badge. It had a blue border, a white center and red numerals. At the top was written ''Clifton Park,'' at the bottom was ''Caddie,'' and in the center was ''83A.''He had always liked the badge and liked it now, maybe even more. The 83 was meaning a little more to him. It has to do with time, with time past, and with now. And No. 83.Back then caddie jobs were scarce.

City golf courses are undervalued assetsAs president of the Belair-Edison Community Association, I am concerned about Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke's intention to cancel the city's contract with the Baltimore Municipal Golf Corp., the non-profit organization that oversees our golf courses. One might wonder why a community president cares about the city golf courses.The golf courses are assets to the community. The community of Belair-Edison has long promoted homeownership and actively markets the community to homebuyers.

First, the young man complimented James Dalaney on his approach shot to the 13th green at Clifton Park Golf Course. Then he pulled a knife and demanded money."

IT'S AMAZING what the Clifton Mansion's flaking paint hides. Like hundred-year-old signatures on the wall.Thomas Ebel and Fitzgerald Gray are unusual detectives, using saws, chisels and paint scrapers to unearth the secrets of university founder Johns Hopkins' summer estate in Clifton Park. Although they are in the beginning stages of restoration work, they have already discovered ornate plaster arches behind the wallboards of a urine-stenched locker room -- once the main parlor -- and trompe l'oeil paintings under a dropped ceiling in the ''state dining room'' where the wealthy merchant entertained such guests as a prince who became King Edward VII.Some of Baltimore's greatest mansions are in public parks.

It used to be one of the premier local tennis tournaments, "the Wimbledon of Baltimore" as Jim Cummings wryly put it.For decades, The Evening Sun tournament attracted the area's best players to Clifton Park's clay courts."

A Charlie Chaplin movie like his early masterpiece "The Kid" (1921) is an ideal choice for an open-air urban screening like the one at 8 tonight at the Clifton Park band shell. That's because Chaplin combined unparalleled high jinks with nonpareil sensitivity. Chaplin's combination of balletic grace and robust iconoclastic farce has never been equaled. He might have carried himself like a European aristocrat in his later years, but his hardscrabble London background was the prime source of his pathos-laden humor.

Baltimore will use $1.2 million in state capital funds to build a new recreation center in Clifton Park, and officials say they are optimistic that money will become available to operate the facility once it opens in two years, despite recent gloomy revenue projections. Lt. Gov. Anthony G. Brown handed city officials an oversized ceremonial check for the planned facility at a news conference Monday afternoon, and said the new recreation center makes good on one of the "handful" of campaign promises that he and Gov. Martin O'Malley made to "restore and renovate facilities so we can better enjoy open space."

One man was killed and another man injured by gunfire early yesterday morning near Clifton Park. Baltimore police said officers were called to the 3200 block of Lyndale Ave. about 2 a.m., where they found two men on the front porch of a home. One had been shot in the shoulder and one in the chest, said Officer Nicole Monroe, a spokeswoman for the police. Both were taken to local hospitals, and the man shot in the chest was pronounced dead at 2:30 a.m. Monroe said she could not release their identities last night because the slain man's family had not been notified.

Northeastern District police responding to a 911 call reporting a man shot in the 3100 block of Belair Road near Clifton Park Terrace about 3:30 p.m. yesterday found the victim lying dead between two parked cars, said Agent Donny Moses, a Police Department spokesman. The man was shot at least once in the head and was pronounced dead at the scene by Fire Department medics, Moses said. Moses said the man's name was withheld pending notification of family members. The scene of the daylight shooting was a busy section of the Belair-Edison neighborhood at the eastern edge of Clifton Park, police said.

Trainer Ned Allard looked at the names of the horses running in the $100,000 Gala Lil Stakes yesterday at Laurel Park and knew his entry, Friel's for Real, was going to be in for a fight. "I thought, `There's no monster in here, but it's going to be very, very competitive,' " said Allard, whose 6-year-old filly by Sword Dancer fought down the stretch to overtake Silmaril and beat her to the finish by a head. "I hate to see a horse run that hard and not win," said Ryan Fogelsonger, who rode Silmaril, trained by Chris Grove.

The Clifton Park Valve House is a wreck, slowly decaying as time passes. Surrounded by chain-link fence, its stained-glass windows are shattered, and the sky is clearly visible through missing roof tiles. Developer Charles T. Jeffries wants to restore the rare 1888 octagonal structure and transform it into offices. But his dream seems unlikely to become reality. After years of delay and wrangling, city officials have had enough of Jeffries and his Center Development Corp. He missed the contractual deadline to begin construction, so the city has terminated his 50-year lease on the property in Northeast Baltimore's Clifton Park.

Baltimore: Southwest Church group gets eviction reprieve An evangelical church group facing an order to leave the former Southwestern District police headquarters has received a last-minute, two-week reprieve. The state Court of Special Appeals has issued a stay of the eviction, which had been scheduled for yesterday, to give the court time to consider a last appeal by the church group, which goes by the names Metro Ministries and Charm City Church. The church group has been occupying the building at West Pratt and South Calhoun streets since last year, when it signed a lease with a landlord who later learned that the city had accidentally sold the building twice at auction.

Where -- 2701 Saint Lo Drive, Baltimore Phone -- 410-243-3500 On the web -- bmgcgolf.com Dress code -- Flat sole shoes, no tank tops Holes -- 18 Course description -- Built in 1915, Clifton Park was the first public golf course in Baltimore. Tees -- Back, 5,954; middle, 5,714; front, 5,469 Best times -- Weekday mid-afternoon, weekend twilight Time spacing -- Eight minutes Weekend time -- If more than one or two golfers, need a start time Cost -- $26 weekend, $23 weekday, $23 seniors, twilight rates (times vary, four phases)

NOW OR NEVER In Hampden tomorrow, New York photographer John Glassie will present images of bicycles locked to poles in his East Village neighborhood. The photographs are from his book Bicycles Locked to Poles. His passion began with a Dali-esque bent bicycle wheel he passed every day for months. Glassie will also discuss other "inventory" artists, including John James Audubon, who painted birds, Bernd and Hill Becher, who shot water towers and Tudor houses, and Arnold Odermatt, a Swiss police officer who captured traffic accidents for 40 years.

In Baltimore City 18-year-old dies after being shot while driving in Clifton Park An 18-year-old died yesterday evening at Johns Hopkins Hospital after he was shot inside his car while driving along St. Lo Drive in Clifton Park, city police said. The shooting occurred about 5 p.m. between Lake Clifton-Eastern High School and the Lawrence G. Paquin School, but did not involve either, police said. The victim, Reginald Gray of the 5600 block of Kavon Ave., was found behind the steering wheel of a Ford Crown Victoria bleeding from at least one gunshot wound.