On Monday morning across town at the prestigious Sycamore Hills Golf Club, dozens of golfers lifted their precision clubs from the trunks of their spotless automobiles. Then, wearing designer shirts and matching pressed slacks and the mandatory soft spikes, they strode confidently to the tee areas that are level rectangles of close-cut greenery. From this vista is a runway of manicured fairway, and finally the carpet-like putting green. And as each player stepped onto the No. 1 tee to begin the Mad Anthonys Charity Classic for Children, his or her name was announced by the official starter.

Miles away on an open field of clover and grass and weeds at McMillen Park and beneath the same sky that threatened rain, gregarious Kyle Calloway is also a starter, of sorts, because he welcomes about 75 boys and girls with a booming, “Good morning!” Several respond without much volume.

“My goodness,” says the man in the white hat and shirt. “You can do better than that.” So he yells the same “Good morning!” and they holler back in unison with a louder “Good morning!” of their own.

Thus began the golf portion of the 12th annual Lifetime Sports Academy, a seven-week program of free instruction to introduce golf, tennis and swimming to any child age 8 to 18.

And here’s the beauty of the first 11 years with one more now under way: The kids don’t need a tennis racket or a golf club to participate, because that is all provided. So is lunch.

As for soft spikes? The softest thing at McMillen are the hearts of those involved, and that includes many of those same, more fortunate players who were across town Monday morning; for it was the Mad Anthonys organization that donated $15,000 to the Lifetime Sports Academy last year.

It’s certainly a contrast – these two events that occurred on the same day – but their missions fit together like a hand in a Velcro-closed golf glove. But then that’s how the academy’s founder, the late Tom Jehl, and Saint Francis football coach Kevin Donley began their long friendship when each was invited onto a local radio program 12 years ago.

Jehl was to talk about the beginning of the academy; Donley was to talk about the beginning of a football program at Saint Francis.

And while each had his own agenda, they didn’t know at the time that they were on the same path all along.

“The core values of what this is all about – and what we’re all about at Saint Francis – are the exact same things,” said Donley, who spoke briefly at the academy’s opening ceremony. “They teach how to hit a chip shot and a drive and how to swim and hit a backhand and we teach blocking and tackling, but it is really about life skills; not only skills about sports and, in this case, lifetime sports, but lifetime skills – character, integrity, developing relationships with people who help you get through sports. That’s the message that Tom had that has helped me develop our program at Saint Francis.”

And on Monday morning, 11-year-old Betty VanDell, wearing a Fort Myers Beach T-shirt, stepped onto the practice mat and held a golf club over a ball.

“You ever play before?” a helper asks.

She tells him no.

With a determined young face, she swings and misses. And swings, and hits the ball 5 feet. She seems pleased.

“It’s going to be challenging at first,” Betty says afterward. “But I think golf will be fun.”

Fun?

Oh, Betty, you poor, unsuspecting dear.