For more than 75 years, many of the nation’s best junior golfers have traveled to Dothan, Alabama, to play in the Press Thornton Future Masters. And for all of those years, members of the Thornton family have worked the tournament in various roles, from chairman to scorekeepers and marshals.
“The family is very entrenched in the game and loves the game of golf,” said King Thornton, general chairman of the tournament and grandson of tournament founder Press Thornton Sr. “We’ve always had the mindset of trying to foster the sportsmanship and camaraderie of golf and doing it through the junior circuit.”
Starting June 21, hundreds of boys ages 8-18 will compete for titles in four age divisions at Dothan Country Club. The 10-under, 11-12 and 13-14 age groups will compete from Sunday through Tuesday, with the 15-18 division vying from Thursday through Saturday. The competitors follow in the footsteps of notable past Future Masters champions such as Scottie Scheffler and 2025 U.S. Amateur champion Mason Howell.
“If you talk to many people in the golf world and you mention Dothan, Alabama, they’re going to say I played in the Future Masters when I was a kid,” said Angelia Turner, the tournament coordinator.
In 1950, Press Thornton Sr. was a member of Dothan Country Club, which had been founded in 1923. His son, Press Thornton Jr., was a good junior golfer but he always had to compete against the older members, and there were no junior tournaments at the club. And so the elder Thornton created the Future Masters to fill a void.
“Mr. Thornton Sr. developed this tournament to give young boys an opportunity to play where they didn’t have to compete against men,” Turner said.
The first tournament was a one-day event with more than 50 participants from Alabama, Florida and Mississippi. It was a resounding success and generated public interest.
“The publisher of the Dothan Eagle, which was the newspaper in town, suggested that they make it an annual event and call it the Press Thornton Future Masters,” Turner said.
Very quickly, the tournament became entwined in the club and the town’s culture. As it grew and more players participated, Dothan residents stepped up.
“When I was growing up we had so many kids coming to play the tournament that the city of Dothan didn’t have enough hotel rooms and the members of the club would all take one or two kids and house them at their own homes,” King Thornton said.
“My dad came up to me and said I don’t care how you play, I just care how you act. I started realizing my family’s name is on this and I want to represent the sportsmanship and the competitiveness of it.” – King Thornton
King himself played in the tournament from the time he was 7 or 8 years old in the late 1960s. Very soon, he realized how important the tournament was to his family.
“My dad came up to me and said I don’t care how you play, I just care how you act,” King recalled. “I started realizing my family’s name is on this and I want to represent the sportsmanship and the competitiveness of it.”
King has seen many players who have gone on to stardom walk the grounds of Dothan Country Club, including Scheffler, the current world No. 1 who won his division in 2006 as a 10-year-old.
In one of the years King played, Jack Nicklaus’ sons Jack Jr. and Gary were in the field. Spectators flocked to the golf course trying to get a glimpse or an autograph from the Golden Bear. King himself had a memorable interaction with Nicklaus.
“I was over on the practice green hitting chip shots,” King said. “I chipped one in and somebody said, ‘Great shot son.’ I turned around and Jack Nicklaus was standing there.”
In his career, Nicklaus won six green jackets at the Masters, and until 1998 the winner of the Future Masters also received a green jacket. But then tournament organizers received a letter from Augusta National’s legal team asking them to make changes.
“Augusta came in that year and asked us not to use the green jacket,” Turner said. “But they gave us their blessing on using the Future Masters and a blessing of the junior tournament.”
So starting with 1998 champion Wesley Pate, son of 1976 U.S. Open champion Jerry Pate, Future Masters winners have received a blue jacket.
In more than 75 years, the tournament has gone from a little more than 50 participants to one that receives nearly 1,000 applications a year. And there hasn’t been much advertising.
“The waiting list is huge,” Turner said. “It’s really word of mouth from the players and the families. We almost don’t want anybody else to know because of all the applications.”
And while the original tournament’s competitors were from three states in the South, in 2025 there were 35 states and six countries represented. International players such as South African Trevor Immelman, who went on to win the 2008 Masters, have made their way to Dothan.
“I remember being able to play this great event back in 1994 as a 14-year-old,” Immelmen says in a video on the Future Masters’ website. “It’s a week I remember so fondly and it was a week that really was an amazing stepping stone for me.
Today, it is becoming more difficult to host an event of this magnitude at a private club. Members often don’t want to give up their golf course for a weekend, much less the eight days the Future Masters lasts. But as far as King can remember, only one Dothan Country Club member has ever brought up the issue.
“The club definitely embraces it,” King said. “When you join the club that’s part of the little tour they give.”
And so does Dothan. According to Turner and the Future Masters’ website, the direct economic impact of the tournament is more than $750,000 yearly to the city of Dothan. The impact is to restaurants, shops and hotels. The indirect economic impact of the tournament over 75 years has been an estimated $66 million.
“The whole city gets behind it,” Turner said. “The restaurants love for the kids to come. The hotels get involved. Our media does a great job. It’s just one week out of the year that the city of Dothan and the area makes these young families and young children feel special.”
And despite there being fewer host families these days, some residents still proudly host the young competitors while also watching them play along with more than 200 local volunteers.
“They get to see these kids like a Scottie Scheffler when he is 10 years old come out and play and 10 years later they’re out on the PGA Tour,” Turner said.
While players have come and gone, the Thorntons have remained. Like multiple Thorntons before him, King’s son Luke played in the Future Masters.
“Watching him was probably more nerve-wracking than any golf I played myself,” King said.
Luke is a student at the University of Alabama. While his son doesn’t play on the golf team, King would love for Luke to work the Future Masters in the future like his family members before him.
“He has the personality to meet and greet people a lot like my father did,” King said. “I would love for him and my daughter Evie to be involved in the tournament and I’m sure they want to as well.”