Exclusive:Winner of 2025 Scottish Golf Lifetime Honour announced

June McEwan, a well-kent face through being one of the best servants to golf in its birthplace as a volunteer spanning five decades, has been named as the recipient of the 2025 Scottish Golf Lifetime Honour Award.

The 78-year-old from North Berwick will pick up the prize, sponsored by Cyber Mulligan, at Friday’s Scottish Golf Awards in Glasgow along with ten other category winners drawn from all levels of the game.

McEwan first became involved in volunteering at club level before becoming a respected figure nationally through the Scottish Ladies Golfing Association and then becoming the first female president of Scottish Golf.

“There are so many people who give hours of their life to various things in golf,” said McEwan. “It’s not just about the ones that are visible. It’s about the ones that keep the game going.

June McEwan has been announced as the winner of the 2025 Scottish Golf Lifetime Honour Award, sponsored by Cyber Mulligan | Scottish Golf

“I’ve done a lot of lovely things because the governing bodies have allowed me to do it and I don’t know what I’ve done to achieve this because I’ve just toddled along doing my thing.

“The things I do are part of a team and there’s no ‘I’ in team. If I hadn’t done it, somebody else would. I couldn’t believe it when I was told I’d won and I’m extremely honoured.”

McEwan first stepped up to lend a helping hand at Gifford in the 1980s, since when her tireless efforts in the fields of course rating, handicapping and rules have won her many admirers and friends down the years.

From those early days as a junior convenor at Gifford, she has gone on to support the game at committee, board and national level culminating in her being named as the first female president of Scottish Golf in 2018.

Over the years, McEwan has also served as a board member at Longniddry, on the Council of National Golf Unions (CONGU) and with the aforementioned SLGA.

Crucially, she was instrumental in helping to develop and grow the course rating system in Scotland from 2002 by not only operating as the lead assessor but also acting as a training mentor for other volunteers.

June McEwan’s volunteering role in golf has spanned five decades after first lending a hand at Gifford Golf Club in East Lothian | Scottish Golf

“When I was on the SLGA at club level and doing handicaps for hundreds of years, there was a lovely lady called Ethel Jack who was the top of the handicapping,” added McEwan. “She said to me ‘I think you could come on board’. I got into course rating in 2002. Some weeks you could be doing five or six hours a day going round courses representing the SLGA.”

During her years as a referee, McEwan has worked at the Curtis Cup, at numerous LET events and, most proudly, at the 2019 Junior Solheim Cup and the 2013 Open Championship at Muirfield.

“I got into golf because my husband Morris played to a very good level and he was always away at amateur events. I went with him otherwise I wouldn’t see him!” she said with one of her warm smiles. “Soon I developed a love for the game and I just feel so lucky to have been involved with so many wonderful people over the years.”