By JIM PETTIT

As spring inches toward summer, golf is again being played in North Carolina just as it has for decades.

But it isn't the same.

The king is dead, and there is no successor.

When Dugan Aycock died March 23 at the age of 92, North Carolina golf lost one of its legends.

Dubbed the ''King of the Jungle'' by fellow pros for his sometimes errant shots, Aycock was a member of the PGA for 68 years. A list of his honors and accomplishments stretches out like a Pinehurst par 5 from the tips.

He spent 14 years as president of the Carolinas Section of the PGA, including an unbroken stretch from 1948 to 1958. He was the national PGA Professional of the Year in 1957. He officiated Ryder Cup matches. Aycock was a fixture at professional tournaments throughout North Carolina, serving as the 18th hole announcer at the Greater Greensboro Open (now Chrysler Classic) for many years.

He was inducted in the Carolinas PGA Hall of Fame in 1981 and the Carolinas Golf Hall of Fame a year later.

But Dugan Aycock, or just ''Doog'' to those who knew him, wasn't hung up on awards. He specialized in service.

No youngster who showed an interest in golf was ever turned away for lack of money or clubs. No fellow professional suffered alone through personal hardship if Aycock found out about it. He would launch a fund-raiser for a good cause as impressively as Tiger Woods can launch a 9-iron.

Aycock was a native of Charlotte. He got his start in golf as a caddie at Charlotte Country Club but is forever linked with the Davidson County town of Lexington.

The hard working, idea churning pro and the relaxed, friendly Lexington residents were a perfect match.

Aycock designed Lexington Country Club and was head professional there for 38 of the next 40 years, starting in 1938. After retirement, he remained as a consultant and was a regular visitor to the course as often as his health would permit.

Aycock could tell stories from dusk until dawn about his associations with such legendary players as Walter Hagen, Sam Snead, Bobby Locke and Ben Hogan. Change eras and Aycock never broke stride, offering stories about Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Lee Trevino and many, many others.

But Dugan Aycock was a story himself.

There was the time in 1947 when polio was raging, the crippling disease still years away from a vaccine. The March of Dimes campaign in Lexington was going poorly and needed a boost.

Aycock came up with the idea of playing golf cross-country from Lexington to the ninth hole at Thomasville Golf Course in the neighboring city about 10 miles away.

Donors were asked to contribute and guess how many strokes it would take Aycock to complete the route.

Before he teed off, Aycock wrote his guess on a piece of paper, slipped it into an envelope and sealed it.

The adventure began with Aycock teeing off from the square in downtown Lexington. He was accompanied by six forecaddies, two scorekeepers and caddie Bill ‘‘Earthquake’’ Smith, who was a former star football player at the University of North Carolina.

Aycock was allowed to tee the ball up on every shot except those that found water or ditches. He had to take penalty shots on those.

The group played through town, proceeded along old Highway 29, then cut across country and entered Thomasville along railroad tracks that ran past the golf course.

''One guy sent in 2,000 strokes as his guess,'' Aycock said in an interview some years ago, still irked by the high estimate. ''I said at the time that the guy must be thinking I was going to play from Lexington to Chicago.''

Aycock's actual number of strokes was 114. When his sealed envelope was opened, the number he had written was 115.

The event drew national attention and raised more than $5,000 for the March of Dimes.

As head pro at High Point's Blair Park Golf Course after it opened in the early 1930s, Aycock once played in an exhibition match against Walter Hagen. Aycock's partner was Andy Merrilees, the head pro at High Point's Emerywood Country Club. Hagen's partner was a fellow touring pro, Joe Kirkwood.

The match was played at Emerywood, a nine-hole course.

''Hagen was one of the greatest golfers of all time,'' Aycock said. ''He was a tremendous player. He loved to party, but he could always come back from it and play golf.''

The match was close. After nine holes, Hagen went into the clubhouse where he asked for a hefty serving of bourbon that would have flattened most men. He downed it quickly and returned to the tee box to start the second nine.

''Kirkwood and Merrilees had both missed the green,'' Aycock remembered. ''Hagen was on the green about 35 feet away, and I hit one in about two-and-a-half feet.

''When we got to the green, Hagen walked over and knocked my ball back to me. He said, 'You're going to get a halve here' and then went back to his ball and knocked it right into the cup.''

Aycock and Merrilees held on to win the match 1-up.

Aycock lived to see golfers advance from Craig Wood to Tiger Woods. He saw sand greens give way to hybrid grasses. He saw his beloved sport shift from a pastime of the elite to recreation enjoyed by all ages and occupations.

Don Padgett of Pinehurst, a former president of the PGA of America and Aycock's long-time friend, probably said it best.

''Dugan Aycock was Mr. Golf in the Carolinas for a long, long time,'' Padgett said. ''If you wanted to get something done, Dugan was the man to take on the assignment. There is no way to gauge the pleasure this man provided for the men, women, and especially children he introduced to the game. To him, golf was almost a religion. And he was a great missionary. He will be missed but never forgotten.''