Palm Beach County Sports Commission board member Malachi Knowles, the founder of the Riviera Beach-based Inner City Youth Golfers and African American Golfers Hall of Fame, has been inducted into the Florida Black Sports Hall of Fame.
Knowles has been involved in the game of golf since he was 10 years old when he began working as the “shag boy” at Everglades Country Club in Palm Beach. Knowles went on to attend Morgan State College in Baltimore, Maryland. At Morgan State, he worked with the athletic director to establish a golf team that he captained for three years. After graduation, he went on to become the first African American to graduate with a master’s degree in regional and city planning from the University of Oklahoma. Knowles would go on to hold several executive positions with the government from 1965 to 1991.
In 1993, he returned to Riviera Beach to found Inner City Youth Golfers with a mission of combining golf and education to positively impact local youth. In 2004, he founded the African American Golfers Hall of Fame to provide future generations of golfers with role models within the sport. He was inducted into the Palm Beach County Sports Hall of Fame in 2016. He currently serves on the Palm Beach County Sports Commission Board of Directors.
The Florida Black Sports Hall of Fame is a nonprofit organization dedicated to “recognizing and honoring the outstanding contributions of athletes, teams, coaches, and anyone who shares the love of sports.” Among the many legendary Florida sports figures, the inaugural 2020 class includes Palm Beach County natives and NFL players Travis Rudolph and Anquan Boldin.
