When Larry Gillespie was just a kid in high school in the mid-1960s, he got a summer job helping the developer of a new golf course clear the land for the Kingwood Country Club in Clayton. After several starts and stops, the golf club failed and closed in 1982. It wasn't resurrected until 1997.

Gillespie remembers walking behind the tractor clearing rocks for the fairways as a young man. It took him nearly 30 years to come full circle, and in September 2002, he and his wife, Marie, built a 6,000-square-foot home on the No. 14, par 3 hole at the new Kingwood Golf Club and Resort.

The new course focuses on Chechero Creek meandering through the fairways. Golf architect Scott Pool took advantage of the waterways and contours of the mountain course to raise the level of play. This time the homes tucked into mountainsides and the course itself are complemented by the rolling topography.

Gillespie says proudly, "Rabun County is beautiful, so living on a golf course is doubly wonderful." He can come home and walk right onto the course and play a few holes. In the summer, he says, he can stay on the course until 9 p.m. "My wife plays, too, so this was a smart investment for us." If it's not snowing, most days you'll find the Gillespies on the course.

Another Clayton native to return to the old homestead is Dana Seay. She was raised in Clayton and spent holidays at the old King mansion as a child. She moved away and found her life in Atlanta with husband David. He recalls, "We talked a lot about the mountains and even bought property several years ago around Lake Burton. We never utilized it, but we kept talking about wanting to get back to the mountains."

According to Seay, it happened quickly. "I came up here one weekend on my own and just turned down U.S. 76 and was surprised to find this beautiful golf course. I came home and in a roundabout conversation told Dana I had put a deposit on a condo at the Kingwood Resort."

She quickly adds to the story: "Right away, I said, 'Oh, I feel like I'm going home!' "

The Seays used their condo on weekends and found plenty of reasons to upgrade and build a large home. They were coming so often , they decided to live at Kingwood year-round. "My wife didn't play golf when we first bought the condo, but now I can't get her off the course, " he says.

"Clayton has changed enough to make year-round living comfortable, " he says. "We have a Super Wal-Mart, Chick-fil-A, and bigger stores are coming, " Seay says. The Kingwood Inn is one of the few formal restaurants, but plenty of family-owned establishments are scattered throughout Clayton.

Homebodies Tom and Eileen Ash admit that they don't care if they ever leave home. Their house and lifestyle fit their every need. They found a Kingwood Golf Club and Resort ad in the paper for a golf package weekend deal. It was a good way to check it out. They bought a condo first. "Then we built our dream home, " she says.

Eileen Ash designed her kitchen to include a range with six burners. "We decided to make it a combination propane gas/electric oven, " she explained. "If the power goes out up here in the mountains, no problem --- because the oven converts."

They pored over more than 500 house plans before deciding on their old French Normandy-style home. "Our builder set it perfectly on our lot, " she says. "I get the morning sun at the front of our home, and we watch it set from the back."

The upstairs guest rooms were designed to tempt their grown kids to make lots of visits. The 6,000-square-foot home has three bedrooms upstairs and the master with its own den on the main floor.

Her bamboo floors are one of her favorite details. The entryway is slate and framed in the bamboo. The master is carpeted, but the room is framed with bamboo trim. "It unifies the entire first floor and it's unique, " she says. "I've never seen it done like this."

To start with, Kingwood was a "try it on for size" experience, Tom Ash says. "Initially, we stayed at the Kingwood Inn right here at the resort, " but eventually, "we'd come up so often to golf that it finally made sense to buy a condo."

It became part of their life because "it was just one of the best resorts we'd seen, " he said, "and we found every excuse to come up. Finally, we got smart one day and made the plunge to move up permanently. And now we have this beautiful home. "

The resort offers year-round activities. The indoor heated pool is fun even on snowy days, and the spa has a Jacuzzi, steam room and exercise room. The activities director plans hikes, trips to the Cherokee Indian casinos and excursions to Atlanta for concerts. There's also other events. For business or big social events, there's the conference center, which holds 150 and has extra rooms --- just in case.

The location is handy, too, because "our children live in South Carolina, " Eileen Ash says. The drive isn't bad, and "there are some lovely malls on our way there." For shorter jaunts, "we found a nice mall with a Belk in Gainesville, 30 minutes away, " she says.

"But our favorite pastime is to just sit up here warm and cozy and enjoy why we came here in the first place, " she says. "This is our life --- just golf and bluejeans."

Getting there

From downtown Atlanta, take I-85 north to I-985 to Exit 113 (Lanier Parkway). Go left. Merge onto Ga. 365 north, which becomes U.S. 23/U.S. 441, and follow to Clayton, then turn right on U.S. 76 east. The development is on the left.

HISTORY

Clayton's Kingwood golf community was built around the old King mansion in the mid-1960s. It functioned for years as a golf course, but never more than a handful of homes were sold. After several developers attempted to jump-start new ideas for a golf community, the golf course closed in 1982 and sat dormant for 15 years. In 1997, J.T. Williams/Killearn Development reopened the mountain property and brought in golf architect Scott Pool to design an 18-hole course around Chechero Creek. Kingwood Golf Club and Resort opened with new condo designs and homesites on 700 acres surrounded by 143,000 acres of a national forest. The Kingwood Inn has entertained some interesting characters. During the filming of "Deliverance" in 1971, Burt Reynolds and Jon Voight were guests here. Kingwood Golf Club and Resort is in the town of Clayton in Rabun County, 90 miles north of downtown Atlanta in the North Georgia mountains.

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