THE REMARKABLE LIFE OF JIMMIE JAMES

He grew up in extreme poverty but became the only person to play the US’ Top 100 Courses (half of which are exceptionally private) in a year… Now Jimmie James is ticking off the World Top 100. This is his inspirational story...

I was born in poverty in the piney woods of East Texas. I was the fourth child born to my single mother. I attended segregated public schools until the fourth grade.

During my early childhood we lived in a wooden, tin-roof shack with no electricity nor plumbing. For the first seven years of my life, everything we ate we either grew, raised or killed. After those seven years we moved to the city and went from dilapidated house to dilapidated house, always infested with rats and ’roaches.

Golf played no part of my childhood. I remember seeing an interview with Jack Nicklaus when I was around 10 or 11, but I followed and played American football instead.

I was the first in my family to graduate from high school and to attend college. I received a partial scholarship and I worked my way through college by selling encyclopaedias door to door and by working at a department store in the evenings and weekends selling major appliances.

I majored in civil engineering and graduated at the top of my engineering class, then I started my career at Exxon as an engineer. I progressed up the corporate ladder over a 33-year career and retired as an executive.

I started playing golf aged 45 after a VP in my company recommended it as a way to build relationships with the people I worked with.

My wife gifted me a set of golf clubs and some lessons. That was 2004. In 2006 we started vacationing in Kiawah Island, South Carolina. My first top course was the Ocean Course at Kiawah. In 2009 I played the Country Club of Brookline and in 2014 I played the Blue Course at Congressional Country Club. Those were the only Top 100 courses I played before starting my quest, in 2017, to play all of the Top 100 courses within 12 months.

Eighty-seven of the 100 courses I played during that year were at private clubs. I got invites on 12 of them through contacts I already knew, the remaining 75 came from people I met during that year.

People ask if I have ever been made to feel uncomfortable at an elite US club. The answer is ‘No’.

The fact that I got invites to all of the clubs and was treated well at every one of them shows that while we still have a long way to go, some progress has been made in terms of race and class. I should, though, point out that my current financial status probably makes it easier for me than black golfers who are not of the same financial status as the members at these elite clubs.

I have been so fortunate with where I have played. From all those experiences, I certainly have a few favourites. Augusta National would be one of them. Every blade of grass is in its place there. Augusta is more a place than a golf course.

Royal County Down has to be another, with its natural contours that wind their way along the Irish Sea and with the Mountains of Mourne falling off to the sea as a backdrop.

And The Old Course at St Andrews with its rich history and well-known holes – that’s impossible to overlook.

I have been so fortunate that I now have no wish list. I now have access to any course I want to play thanks to the kindness and generosity of golfers who have reached out to me following my quest.

Jimmie’s memoir, Playing From The Rough, will be published in 2023 by Simon & Schuster, the story of his journey from extreme poverty to a world of privilege woven through an improbable quest to play America’s 100 greatest golf courses.