The Clubhouse at Aiken Golf Club, ca. 1912 The decade of the Nineties was a time of change, as Americans transitioned from the Reagan/Bush Era to that of Clinton/Gore, and the world saw the Soviet Union crumble and East and Weat Germany reunite. People embraced the advent of the World Wide Web, synth pop and hair metal bands gave way to alt rock and hip-hop, and folks began to give up their land lines in favor of cellular phones. It was the era of Beanie Babies, the O.J. Simp

Ian Baker-Finch When Ian Baker Finch won his first PGA tournament, the 1989 Southwestern Bell Colonial Invitational, Mark Wohlers was an on-again-off-again starter with the Atlanta Braves' Class A farm team in Sumter, South Carolina. Twenty-eight year-old Baker-Finch was a 10-year golf pro from Australia playing his first full year on the PGA Tour. Nine years his junior, Wohlers grew up in Holyoke, Massachusetts, where he pitched and played first base for the Holyoke High Pur

Hope Ann Seignious, 1919-1968 (Courtesy Williamsburg County Historical Society) Kingstree, South Carolina is a peaceful town on the Black River known more for its barbecue and quarterhorse racing than it is for golf. Its origins trace back to colonial days, when Captain Roger Gordon and a group of 40 Scotch-Irish immigrants established a settlement there to serve as a buffer between the Indian Territory and the plantations of Charleston, located 70 miles to the south. It take

Jimmy Demaret at the 1951 Houston Open (Maurice Miller, Houston Chronicle Photo) When Memorial Park Golf Course in Houston hosted last week's LPGA Chevron Championship, it marked the first time in 75 years that professional golf tournaments have been held at Memorial Park and Mexico City's Club de Golf Chapultepec in consecutive weeks. Off-course news surrounding the events this year centered around Bryson DeChambeau's complaints about course conditions at Chapultepec, the la

Chuck Hofius with Kratzert in the 10th Fairway Imagine you're at a cocktail party and over the music and hum of conversation, you hear a guy talking animatedly about the 1986 Masters. He mentions how he attended the Masters that year with no other goal but to spend a week away from work at the Mecca of Golf, but wound up being asked to caddy in the tournament. Intrigued, you slide into the group to hear him say that not only did he caddie, but the guy he caddied for was tied

The second green at Augusta National as viewed from the fairway. (Stock Photo) Raymond Floyd strode down Augusta National's second fairway during the first round of the 1976 Masters Tournament. Known as Pink Dogwood, the par-5 2nd was the course's longest hole, both for pros and members, but played shorter than its measured 555 yards. With his drive safely clear of the fairway bunker on the right, Floyd meticulously examined his lie, surveyed the wide, shallow green over 220

Two weekends ago, eastern South Carolina was blanketed with an unusual five inches of snow, prompting dozens of local children to break out everything from sleds to plastic storage lids to cardboard boxes and head to the hill on Florence Country Club's 18th hole for a day of high-speed winter fun. As I viewed the photos of the children and their parents sledding on the golf course and later that afternoon, read about the LPGA's debacle down in Florida, my curiosity got the be

Charlie Coe receives the Havemeyer Trophy from USGA President John Ames at the 1958 U.S. Amateur (AP Wire Photo) Thank God it was a 36-hole match. That thought crossed Charlie Coe’s mind several times as he fiddled with his swing on the first nine of his final match at the 1958 U.S. Amateur. During his semifinal match, a 3 and 2 win over Roger McManus, he couldn't get comfortable in his stance. The insecurities that plagued him the previous year were threatening to resurface

FMU Hall-of-Famer Tommy Randall (FMU Golf Photo) This past week, a 17 year-old golfer from South Carolina fell victim to the Rules of Golf at the U.S. Junior Amateur Championship. Lancaster’s Banks Steele was disqualified from the tournament when his caddie tossed his hat into the air to measure the wind, violating the rule that prohibits use of "an artificial object to get other wind-related information." In an age where distance measuring devices--unquestionably artificial-

Practicing physician, lifelong golfer, and history-lover

Ed Furgol accepts the 1954 U.S. Open Trophy Anyone familiar with golf knows about the WGR and the WAGR, the systems for ranking the...

LPGA and World Golf Hall of Famer, Carol Mann Televised Golf's Beginnings When Babe Zaharias won the inaugural U.S. Women's Open in 1948,...

Oakmont Country Club's 182 yard, par 3 13th Hole (USGA photo) Twelve holes into his third round, Bobby Jones could taste victory as if it...

While it may seem strange to be talking about the Los Angeles Open (now the PGA's Genesis Invitational) on Memorial Day, it's because sadly, Searles holds one other distinction in the annals of golf history . On April 20, 1945, Searles became the only American professional golfer to be killed in action during World War II.

If you were watching the telecast, you probably still remember Jim Nantz's call as the ball was in the air. "The fairy tale story...," Nantz says, pausing dramatically as we followed its flight, "JUST GOT BETTER!" Who can forget Michael Block's slam dunk ace at the 15th in the final round of the 2023 PGA Championship? Over the years, few club pros had been as competitive in the PGA Championship. In fact, former Masters champ Bernhard Langer once said he wished there were fewe

You'd never put these two guys together. If the PGA Tour had a Word Association Test, the name Gary McCord would evoke adjectives such as maverick, irreverent, and outspoken. In contrast, Larry Nelson would be characterized by words like quiet, unassuming, and family man. They were both star baseball players in high school, and they were both married before age twenty to their high school sweethearts, but other than that--and their mutual love of golf--there are few similarit

You've heard of The Match and the Battle at Bighorn, but have you ever heard of the Nebraska Nassau? Well, that's not its real name--there wasn't one--but if televised golf were a thing back in the 1940s, that would have been an excellent tag for it. As newspapers and radios across the country buzzed with reports of massive German surrenders and the heroic advance of the 3rd Infantry and 101st Airborne divisions on Berchtesgaden, a different kind of showdown was about to take

Horton Smith helps settle 1950 PGA uprising that served as early precursor to the PGA Tour

Meet Henry J. Brown, the man who made history caddying for Lee Elder in the 1975 Masters Tournament.