Sonja Smith
February 16, 1932 – July 7, 2020
The practice among the greens crew at Oceanside County Club is to not socialize with the golfers. So there was confusion early one morning when the crew, with a new hire, encountered a golfer playing alone on the back nine. The crew stopped for their daily chat, engaging the woman in a little political banter and coaching her on her swing before parting.
“I thought we weren’t supposed to engage with members,” the new hire later commented.
“Oh, you can talk to HER,” came the reply. “That’s Mrs. Smith. She’s the exception.”
In fact, Sonja Smith was exceptional in nearly all she did, though she rarely saw that in herself.
She didn’t consider herself athletic: “I participated in every sport available (in high school),” she said, “and was bad at every one of them.” Yet she golfed for more than 40 years, never playing competitively and always looking to improve her game. As her original foursome predeceased her one by one, she continued to play four mornings a week… alone — except for the greens crew, who became her friends and de facto golfing companions.
“All the employees loved her, that’s for sure,” said Danny Aylwin, Oceanside’s Greens Superintendent for 26 years and Sonja’s longtime friend.
Along the way, she scored three holes-in-one:
•1975: Tomoka Oaks CC, hole No. 8, a 3-wood from 188 yards, age 43.
•1998: Oceanside, hole No. 16, a 7-iron over the water from 125 yards, age 66.
•2009: Oceanside, same hole, 5-iron, age 77.
Her golf experience was not unlike her early academic challenges. She considered herself an average student, except in math, where she excelled, yet was among the top 10 students in her high school graduating class, was among only five percent in her class to attend college and was captain of the cheerleading squad.
She didn’t consider herself a particularly good mother – “I had no idea what I was doing when I had you kids,” she’d say – yet she was always there for them and gave them every opportunity to succeed. She always apologized for her cooking, yet today her children all clamber for her recipes.
Sonja didn’t consider herself ambitious, yet she provided an invaluable spark to her husband’s business in Holly Hill – Mac Smith Equipment Company – which provided construction equipment for Daytona’s first beachside high-rise condo, the Towers, and virtually every other beachside condo and hotel built during the ’70s, as well as the first buildings at Embry Riddle and UCF. Her innate people skills with construction superintendents at nearly every major building site in the area proved instrumental in driving the business’ success.
She didn’t consider herself to be brave, yet after Mac took up competitive sailing during the 1970s and raced single-handed across the Atlantic, Sonja took sailing classes, traversed the Halifax River single-handed, and later lived to tell of surviving hurricane force winds and sailing under bare poles in bitter conditions during an epic trans-Atlantic voyage from Daytona to England with her husband.
She did enjoy history and current events and took the only known color photographs of the landmark Ormond Garage when it burned down in January 1976. Born in Johnson City, NY, on Feb. 16, 1932, Sonja was the daughter of Polish-born father Andrew Chyll, who emigrated from Russia to the U.S. in 1927, and a first-generation American mother, Steffie Kwiatkowski, of Russian descent. Named for Sonja Henie, a three-time Olympic figure skating champion, Sonja put herself through college by working several jobs at a time. It was there that she met her future husband, and on March 26, 1953, she and Mac were married. “We’re perfect for each other,” she would say. They celebrated their 67th year of marriage this year. On Tuesday, July 7, Sonja’s wondrous life journey came to end.
She is survived by her husband, Mac; son Andy (Sharon); daughters Becky Bernstein (Bruce) and Amy Cleveland (Fred) and son-in-law Robert Bravo; sister Linda DeCastro; grandchildren Julie Smith, Kyle Smith, Tyler Smith and Alex Jensen; nieces Sonia DeCastro, Jenna Hutchinson, Cindy Kohles and Laura Windmiller; and close friends Danny Aylwin and Stacy McDaniel.
An intimate family gathering in Sonja’s honor was held this weekend in New Smyrna Beach.
In lieu of flowers, please offer a generous tip the next time your waiter, waitress or a service person makes a difference in your life. Sonja would like that.
