Strange Things Seem to
Happen at Opens

By Gordon White: Special to The Pilot

It is easy to think of the United States Open Golf Championship as an efficiently run sports spectacle that pleases producers and fans alike if all you have to judge the event by is the 1999 Open at Pinehurst No. 2, one of the two or three most proficiently conducted Opens in history. There was hardly a glitch.

But those of us who have lived through a few of these annual golfing extravaganzas know that the United States Golf Association has suffered quirky goings on inside and outside of the ropes at both the men’s and women’s Opens. Some of these mishaps were brought on through no fault of the USGA or the host club and some were fully attributable to the honest but bungled intentions of USGA officials. Usually we look back and laugh at the amusing twists and turns of Open fate. On rare occasions tragedy was involved.

A drunk driver nearly ruined the first green on Winged Foot West before the second round of the 1974 Open when Hale Irwin went on to win the first of his three Open championships. Then five years later when Irwin won for the second time, the USGA looked ridiculous when it tried to prevent Lon Hinkle from driving down an alternate fairway at Inverness in Toledo.

Fans parked their cars on the first fairway of the Winged Foot East course at the 1974 Open. This fairway parking lot abuts the first hole of Winged Foot West. A rather inebriated spectator, who was never identified, apparently got that way by spending too much time at the Winged Foot clubhouse bar following the first round.

When this person drove away from the parking area late that night, he or she rode over the first green of Winged Foot West. The USGA pin placement committee discovered the tire tracks at dawn Friday, moved the hole as far from those tracks as possible and said nothing about it. Not one golfer in the field of 156 noticed anything unusual about the first green during that second round.

The USGA made those Winged Foot greens so hard that many approach shots did not hold. It might have been difficult to detect the tracks left by a tank driving over those highway-hard Winged Foot putting surfaces. It was hard greens more than anything else that led to Irwin’s very high winning score of 7-over-par 287.

Wacky Winged Foot

There is just something about Winged Foot that lends itself to wacky distractions at an Open. Traffic control was so poor at the 1984 Open that many golfers caught in a standstill on the two-lane road approaching Winged Foot abandoned their cars and walked or ran to the course the first day in order to make their tee times. Gary Player hopped on the back of a motorcycle and the Hell’s Angel cyclist got him to the course on time. Tom Watson jumped from one car hood to another near the entrance in order to make his tee time.

Because of an ongoing dispute between local Westchester County, N.Y., police and officials at Winged Foot, the police refused to do extra work for traffic control at the Open.

Winged Foot in Mamaroneck, N.Y., started out on the wrong or “West” foot back in 1929 when it hosted an Open for the first time. Both the East and West courses were designed by A.W. Tillinghast and completed in 1923. The USGA decided to stage the 1929 Open on the Winged Foot East course.

However, a blight struck grasses in the area that spring and did much more severe damage to the East course than to the West course. Thus, the USGA moved the Open to the West course. The Open will be held on the West course for the fifth time next year. Bobby Jones won that 1929 Open in a 36-hole playoff over Al Espinosa.

The Women’s Open was staged on Winged Foot East in 1957. This was another of Winged Foot’s bizarre Opens. Betsy Rawls, the apparent runner-up, was declared the winner when Jackie Pung, with the lowest score, signed an incorrect score card for her final round and was thus disqualified.

The Hinkleberry

During the 1979 U.S. Open at Inverness, Hinkle, a big, pudgy golfer who could hit long balls but also some high scores, drove off the eighth tee in the first round by aiming at and landing on the 17th fairway. The eighth hole was a par-5, dogleg left and one of four holes that had been rebuilt for the Open by George Fazio and his nephew, Tom. Hinkle saw a big opening through the trees to the left of the tee which allowed him to drive far down the adjacent 17th fairway. Hinkle hit a 2-iron second shot from the 17th fairway back over the trees to the eighth green and two-putted for a birdie. Jerry Heard followed suit and birdied the hole, also.

USGA officials, abashed by such brazen effrontery that would taunt them in their pursuit of making an Open course difficult, decided to block such unorthodox drives in subsequent rounds. After consulting with the Fazio architects, USGA officials obtained a tall evergreen from a nearby nursery and just before sunrise Friday they planted it in that opening left of the eighth tee.

The trouble was that the newly planted tree was one of the scrawniest pine trees ever culled from a nursery. It had limbs far apart and very few needles. What became known as the “Hinkleberry Tree” was a big joke as Hinkle drove around or through it to reach the 17th fairway in each of the next three rounds of the Open, getting birdie, par, par on No. 8.

There was also a touch of immature silliness at that “Hinkleberry” Open caused by a golfer intent on insulting the game of golf and its protocol. This occurred at the very start of the third round when David Edwards, the 63rd and last person to make the cut, needed a marker to play that Saturday round with him. Bobby Clampett, who had missed the cut, offered to serve as marker and play with Edwards.

Teeing off after Edwards, the 19-year-old Clampett surprised everyone by hitting his drive while on his knees. Few in the gallery laughed. He then hit a bunker shot on the first hole, also from his knees. USGA officials told him to stop the antics. But Clampett persisted and once putted between his legs. Then he repeated his opening prank and hit drives while down on his knees at the 10th and 11th tees. Finally, he was escorted from the course by USGA officials on the 12th hole. That was surely a relief for Edwards.

Today, we are so fortunate to have a grown-up Clampett as an “expert” commentator on golf telecasts.

Where’s the Check?

Dave Hill, who finished second to England’s Tony Jacklin in the 1970 Open at Hazeltine Golf Club outside Minneapolis, made more headlines than Jacklin by leading the loud criticisms of the Robert Trent Jones course. Hill compared it to a cow pasture, saying the designer ruined a good farm. A few days after the Open, Hill received his second-place check for $15,000 from the USGA. The check was not signed.

The 1906 Open was held at the Onwentsia Club in Lake Forest, Ill. Much of this course surrounded a polo field. Polo matches were held inside the golf course during that 12th U.S. Open as Alex Smith shot his way to victory while hearing the mighty hoofbeats of polo ponies. And some golfers complain because folks cough during their backswings.

A season-long threat to Greg Norman and other players came to a head at the 1988 Open on The Country Club course in Brookline, Mass., when a man who had been stalking Norman at tournaments for months was spotted in the gallery. The stalker became quite offensive. Norman and other players pointed him out to security officers and the Brookline police took him into custody but did not arrest him. He disappeared from the golf scene shortly thereafter.

Disaster Waiting to Happen

Possibly the zaniest USGA championship event was the Women’s Open at the NCR Club outside Dayton, Ohio, in 1986. A day before the tournament began, a freight train derailed within a mile of the course and chlorine gas began escaping from two overturned tank cars. People were ordered to evacuate homes, office buildings and motels in the area. This meant that golfers, USGA officials and some of us in the press had no place to stay that night until well after midnight when we began sneaking back into our motels.

Then a violent storm hit the course during the second round. A tornado came within a few yards of the course but did no serious damage. Golf carts were dispatched to get the golfers off the course quickly. Ayako Okamoto of Japan was in an accident when the cart she was riding in slid down a steep hill and slammed into a tree on the driver’s side. The driver was hurt badly but Okamoto was not seriously injured. She finished tied for third.

Sunday morning a 4.0 earthquake northwest of Dayton shook all competitors and officials awake about 5 a.m. Later that day a drunken motorcyclist drove through the rear of the press tent. No one was hurt. Of course, to make things complete, there was a Monday playoff that nobody wanted. Jane Geddes beat Sally Little for the title and we all got out of that place in a hurry, happy to still be in one piece.

Storms have caused most of the tragic events at Opens. Two brothers in the gallery were injured when struck by lightning at Oakmont in Pennsylvania in 1983. One fan was killed when he and five others were struck by lightning at the 1991 Open at rebuilt Hazeltine.

‘Short’ Interlude

Playing the final practice round of the 1983 Open at Oakmont, Forrest Fezler committed a no-no when he wore short pants. USGA officials told him to wear “proper” attire (long pants) during the Open. After playing 71 holes, Fezler ducked into a port-O-John, changed into those short pants, and played the 72nd or final hole in shorts, becoming the first golfer to ever play a stroke or more in a men’s U.S. Open wearing other than long pants or plus fours. He also became the last golfer to wear short pants during a men’s U.S. Open. At least so far.

Just to make sure no one thinks “it can’t happen here,” it must be pointed out that even the well-conducted 1999 Open at Pinehurst had a minor off-course accident. That happened one night during the tournament when a golf cart was driven through the northwest corner of the press tent. The driver skedaddled in a hurry never to be known. Just a few folks were in the tent at the time and nobody was hurt. Some computers were knocked off tables.

Nevertheless, prospects are excellent for another really smooth Open at Pinehurst this June.

Gordon White, who served 43 years as a New York Times sports reporter, can be reached at sports@thepilot.com.