DEATH OF ABERDEEN QUAICH, HAZLEHEAD SPECIALIST ALISTAIR EDDIE

ALISTAIR J EDDIE WITH THE NE DISTRICT SENIORS CHAMPIONSHIP TROPHY (at Deeside GC) IN 2003. IT WAS HIS THIRD SUCCESS IN THE TOURNAMENT. 

Picture courtesy of Aberdeen Journals.

By COLIN FARQUHARSON
Colin@scottishgolfview.com
Alistair Eddie, who played in four out of five consecutive Aberdeen Quaich golf finals in the mid-1970s - and won three of them - has died after a long illness which was diagnosed in 2010.
Alistair James Eddie, who would have had his 71st birthday in February 2013, was at his peak as a Hazlehead Golf Club member at the same time as other leading North-east players such as Sandy Pirie, Ian Creswell, Brian Dignan and Jim Hardie.
No coincidence that Hazlehead won the NE District team championship for the Journal Cup in 1966, 1968, 1970, 1976 and 1980. Hazlehead would win it only one more time (1988) since then. Sic Transit Gloria.
In the days when the City of Aberdeen Quaich tournament at Hazlehead was one of the highlights of the local golfing calendar and would draw big galleries in the later stages, Eddie, then 32 years of age, beat Jimmy Mitchell (Northern) 3 and 1 in the 1974 final. lost to Creswell by one hole in the 1975 final, beat Sandy Pirie at the 19th in the 1977 final and won the the tournament for a third time in 1978, beating John Savege (Royal Aberdeen) by one hole in the final.
Latterly, Eddie became a Deeside Golf Club member. 
He still played a fine game of golf into his later years and won the North-east District Seniors' championship three times - at the Aberdeen Links in 1997, at Banchory in 2001 and at Deeside in 2003.
Alistair was captain of Hazlehead Golf Club for two years in the late 1980s. 
He is survived by his wife Carol (Cooper), who was a champion diver in her heyday, and daughters Anita and Karen from his first marriage, also four grandchildren.
The funeral service will be held at Aberdeen Crematorium (West Chapel) at on Friday, December 7 at 1.35pm.
All friends are respectfully invited.
I reported on many of the tournaments in which Alistair played when he was at his peak. He was a fierce but fair competitor and a Hazlehead specialist.
I last met him must have been about two years ago at Deeside Golf Club's driving range where I had taken my older grandson Nicholas to hit balls.
Alistair happened to be there, not playing but watching if I remember correctly. He was particularly interested in the swing and technique of Nicholas -  who had been about 10 or 11 years old at the time.
"That's one of the best swings I've seen in a youngster for a long, long time," said Alistair.
Which was a very nice thing to say and it was, in a way, a compliment to Nicholas's mother Elaine who checks his swing regularly.
I never saw Alistair again. 
LATER: A J Eddie's  funeral service at Aberdeen Crematorium drew a vast number of his friends, relations and acquaintances to the West Chapel on Friday, December 7. A nice touch that all who attended the service, conducted by  Alisa McDonald (and sang "Amazing Grace" and "My Love is Like a Red, Red Rose") were invited by Carol and the family to tea in the Deeside GC clubhouse lounge after the service. 
Many did accept the invitation and reminisced about the "good old days" when Hazlehead were the golfing Kings of the North-east and Alistair James Eddie was one of the princes.
Carol wrote the eulogy to Alistair, delivered by one of his grandsons.
Her closing words brought a tear to my eye:
"Alistair will have found a golf course up there by now ... all I ask is that he wait on the next tee for me."