FRONT & CENTER

Golf great Arnold Palmer

A regular guy with an infectious sense of fun in a staid gentleman’s game, Arnold Palmer earned fame with a go-for-broke style and showbiz smile. His legion of fans—Arnie’s Army— grew with his stunning come-frombehind win at the U.S. Open in 1960. Going into the final round, tied for 15th and trailing the leader by seven strokes, Palmer birdied six of the first seven holes to erase his deficit. At day’s end, he tossed his visor into the crowd in an act of joy that helped transform golf into a spectator sport.

His dad was a club golf pro

Born in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, to Deacon and Doris Palmer, Arnold learned to play golf at Latrobe Country Club, where Deacon worked as course superintendent and golf pro. In 1971, Arnold bought the place. “It means,” he joked with his dad, “you’d have to work for me.”

His swing was unorthodox

Palmer went after the ball with gusto. As golf writer Randall Mell put it, Palmer didn’t swing the golf club,

“he smashed the ball with a blacksmith’s lash and that crouching corkscrew finish.”

His first pro victory was in Canada

In 1955, he was a rookie on the PGA Tour, driving to tournaments with his first wife, Winnie. At the Canadian Open at Weston Golf and Country Club near Toronto, the pair slept in a tent pitched near the superintendent’s shed. Palmer went on to win the tourney by four strokes. His purse: $2,400.

Palmer was first— at many things

He is credited with launching and pursuing golf’s professional Grand Slam—the Masters, U.S. Open, British Open and PGA—in 1960. In 1968, he was the first protour golfer to reach $1 million in lifetime earnings, and in 2004, he was the first golfer awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

I’ll have what he’s having

On a break while designing a course in California in the late ’60s, Palmer ordered iced tea with lemonade. A woman sitting nearby heard him and asked for “that Arnold Palmer drink.” The rest is beverage history.

~ Arnold Palmer ~ “You can make mistakes when you’re being conservative, so why not go for the hole?”