How I Played the Game

by Byron Nelson

  I missed qualifying by one shot. I got rid of that so-called “special club” as fast as I could, and never saw it again, nor did I ever see that ten cents a mile that year. The worst part, though, was when I had to tell Louise I hadn’t qualified. That made her cry, because it meant we’d have to borrow money from her father to come home. If I remember right, Johnny Revolta beat Tommy Armour in the finals of the PGA that year.

  I’ve never been one to keep old clubs or trophies much. But one thing I do have is a small black notebook that I kept all my tournament records in. It begins in 1935, when I finished second in the Riverside (California) Pro-Am and won $125. It ends after the Masters in 1947, when I finished second again—and won $1500. In that little book I recorded tournament names, dates, my scores, whether I won anything, and what my caddie and entry fees were. In 1944, I expanded on this recordkeeping a bit, and it came in very handy in 1945—but more about that later.

  My 1935 record wasn’t very good. I was still having trouble putting four good rounds together, and my putting was hit-or-miss an awful lot of the time. Greens were so different then. They were very inconsistent, for one thing. Because local committees were in charge of the tournaments, there wasn’t anyone to oversee course conditions everywhere and make sure fairways, roughs, and greens were the same all across the country.

  Even in one tournament, the committee might have only half of the fairways watered. Or the greens might be watered one day and not the next, or watered on the front half and not the back. Of course, they used different types of grasses, too. Common bermuda in the south and southwest, and rye, poa annua, bluegrass, or bent in the north and east. They used a particular type of German bent at Oakmont, Inverness, and Merion that I never saw anywhere else. Each type of grass behaved differently. Some had more grain, some were slower, some grew faster—all of which made a big difference depending on what time of day you played.

  So with different grasses on the greens and inconsistent watering, when it came to the short game, most of the pros worked on pitching and chipping, and very little on putting. Because it just didn’t pay to spend a lot of time on putting. We concentrated more on getting our approach shots as close to the pin as possible.

  My biggest triumph in 1935 was winning the New Jersey State Open that August. I won $400 plus another $40 for the Pro-Am. I played in quite a few local pro-ams around and won a few—though sometimes it was hardly worth the trouble. One I have in my black book says that I tied for first and won $10.40. That wasn’t good money even then, but it did give me a chance to practice—and it never hurts to win.

  My most memorable failure in ’35 was my play in the U.S. Open at Oakmont—my first time to play in it. I had a miserable 315, though the course was hard and the winning score was only 299. It was really disappointing. But there’s another reason I remember that Open so well, and it’s a good one.

  When I got home the first night after we got there, I’d just finished my first practice round, and hadn’t been driving the ball as well as I thought I should. Not that the rest of my game was flawless—far from it. But my driving was the most inconsistent of all. In the past year, I’d bought four drivers, and probably spent more than I should have, since money was very scarce right then. In fact, we were so poor we were staying in the basement of a parsonage while I played in the Open, so you know we weren’t doing too well financially.

  Anyway, that evening, I sat with Louise after dinner and thought about my driving, while she did some needlework. Finally I said, “Louise, I need to buy another driver. I’m driving terrible.” There wasn’t any reaction from Louise for a couple of minutes. Then she put her work down and said, “Byron, we’ve been married over a year. I haven’t bought a new dress or a new pair of shoes or anything for myself in all that time. But you’ve bought four new drivers, and you’re not happy with any of them. One of two things—either you don’t know what kind of driver you want, or you don’t know how to drive.”

  Well, that stopped me in my tracks. Because there was no denying what she’d said was right. So the next morning, early, I took one of the drivers I had, a Spalding, to the shop there at Oakmont as soon as they opened, and went to work. Dutch Loeffler, the pro there for many years, was very kind and let me use whatever I needed.

  Nearly all the drivers then were made with a completely straight face—same as when they had hickory shafts. That straight face worked all right when you pronated and didn’t use your lower body at all, but with the steel shafts, it was very unsatisfactory. Now, I’d had in my mind for quite a while what a driver should really look like. So I began shaving off, very, very gradually, a slight bit off the toe of the club, then the heel, and kept that up till it had a nice little rounded face—what’s called a “bulge.” When I got it to looking exactly like that picture in my mind, I smoothed it off, put the finish on, and went out to play. And I never had any trouble with my driving after that, even though I didn’t score very well in that particular Open.

  Eventually, when I went to work for MacGregor, I had Kuzzy Kustenborder, head of their custom-made club department, make a persimmon driver to those specifications, and that was the driver I used from 1940 throughout the rest of my career. It’s now in the World Golf Hall of Fame. Today, Roger Cleveland of Cleveland Golf Company makes a driver with my name on it that’s an exact copy of the one I used to win nearly all my tournaments. But I guess I might still be looking for the perfect driver if it hadn’t been for what Louise said to me back in 1935.

  I played in thirty-one tournaments that year, won money in nineteen of them, and my scoring average was a little over 73. My winnings were $3,246.40. Then I had my $400 from Mr. Jacobus, and $1500 from Spalding for selling their equipment in the shop and playing their clubs. Total income: $5,146.40. Net profit: $1200.

  In 1936, things started to get a little better. I remember meeting Bob Jones at the Masters that year, though I don’t remember anything about the way I played. I think they had built Jones’ cottage by then, and I do recall noticing that he was following me some as I played, probably in a practice round. It pleased me to realize he thought I was worth watching, knowing his record and his popularity. I tied for twelfth and won $50, which wasn’t as good as what I did in ’35, so I wasn’t any too happy about it. Just made me more determined to get better, though.

  When I got back to Ridgewood, the weather was bad. It rained quite often, which kept most people from coming out to play, so I got to practice a lot, and worked on my game real hard. It paid off, because all of a sudden I stopped having those terrible rounds. Not that I never played badly again, but I quit having two or three bad rounds in a row. To me, a bad round was a 74 or 75, because I felt the key to becoming a really fine player was consistently playing well, shooting par or better all four rounds. And I was getting there.

  The third week in May, I won the Metropolitan Open at Quaker Ridge on Long Island, put on by the Metropolitan Golf Writers’ Association. At that time, this was considered a very important tournament, though the prize money wasn’t big, $1750 total. I felt very fortunate to win it, for which I got $750. The field was great—Craig Wood, Denny Shute, Horton Smith, Paul Runyan—all of the top pros, and I won by three shots. Where were Snead and Hogan? Well, it’s surprising to some people, but Sam Snead didn’t come on the tour till 1937, and though Ben Hogan had turned pro in 1930, two years before me, he never made it to stay until 1938.

  In that Met Open, we had to play thirty-six holes the last day. We had so little money, I couldn’t afford to stay at a hotel or anyplace, so I had to commute every day. Got up about four or five and drove two hours, then drove home at night. In fact, I barely had enough for gas and caddie fees, which were about $5 a day then. I also didn’t have enough money to eat in the clubhouse, so, wearing my knickers, I sat outside and ate a hot dog and a Coke. We still have that picture, too. And the argyle socks I was wearing in that picture were one of two pair that Louise had knitted for me. They were the same pattern and color, the only g
ood ones I had, and when I’d play in a tournament, I’d have to wash one pair at night and wear the other pair the next day, because it would take them nearly a day to dry.

  After winning the Met Open, I had my first real interview. Oh, I’d been asked a few questions the year before when I beat Lawson Little in San Francisco, but this time, it was for real. The newspaperman was George Trevor, and he asked me all sorts of questions. I was unused to this sort of thing, but I was polite as I could be; I answered yes and no and yessir and nosir, but never explained anything. He wrote the next day, “This young man can really play, but he sure doesn’t know how to talk.” He had also noticed my argyle socks, thought I wore the same pair every day, and wrote that I was superstitious. That wasn’t true, of course, but he never asked me about my socks, just about my golf.

  It was right after the Met Open that I had my first opportunity to do an endorsement—but it was certainly a mixed blessing. The company that made a cigarette called 20 Grand asked me if I would do an ad for them. I wouldn’t have to be smoking or even say that I smoked, simply say that I had read the report saying that the cigarettes were low in tar and so forth.

  Well, I had never smoked and didn’t believe in it. In fact, I’d been told from childhood that no one in the Nelson family ever smoked or drank, and while my parents never asked me to promise that I wouldn’t, it was simply a matter of family pride as well as health with me. I knew that to play well, I had to be in the best possible condition at all times.

  To be truthful, I wasn’t comfortable with doing the ad at all, but even with the money from the Met Open, we were really struggling financially. So I said I would. They paid me $500 for a six-month contract, and since I’d had quite a lot of publicity already saying I didn’t smoke or drink or carouse, I thought it would be all right.

  But it wasn’t. As soon as that ad appeared, I began getting letters from Sunday-school teachers and all sorts of people, telling me how I had let them down, that the young people really looked up to me and here I was, more or less saying that smoking was all right. It really upset me. I hadn’t realized till then that people, especially young people, were already looking to me as a role model. I found it more true than ever what my parents had always told me—that whatever you did would have some influence on someone.

  I talked to the 20 Grand people and told them I’d give the money back if they’d stop the ad, but they either couldn’t or wouldn’t. I promised the good Lord that if he’d forgive me I’d never let anyone else down and try to be a good example, and I’ve worked very hard at doing that.

  As a result, people have given me quite a bit of credit for not smoking or drinking, but quite honestly, I never was tempted to do either one. Alcohol, even in a small amount, always had a bad effect on my system, so drinking didn’t appeal to me any more than smoking did. I’ve probably had no more than a dozen drinks in my life—a glass of wine now and then, and once in a great while a vodka and tonic. But I never liked it and it never agreed with me, so I never enjoyed it.

  Louise tried smoking once, though, and it happened about this same time. She and Harold McSpaden’s wife Eva had become good friends, and Eva smoked. One day when we were all together, Eva asked Louise if she’d ever smoked. Louise said no, but decided she wanted to try it, and Eva gave her a cigarette. As soon as I saw her put it in her mouth, I said, “No, you don’t,” but she lighted it anyway, and I reached over and knocked the cigarette from her lips. I didn’t touch her or hurt her in any way, but she was upset with me for doing it that way in front of Eva, and I can see why. Still, I made my point, and it would have been her right to do the same thing if I had been the one to light up.

  As for drinking, I had one bad experience with it that taught me a good lesson. It was during the Miami Open in 1940, and I was leading going into the fourth round. There was a party that night, and someone talked me into having a glass of champagne. Since I wasn’t used to alcohol, I didn’t really like the taste, but I drank it and it didn’t seem to bother me much, though I could feel it some.

  The next morning, I was thirsty when I got up, probably because of the champagne, and I had a glass of water. Right away, I got to feeling what it must be like to be either really drunk or hung over. I felt very bad, and when I got to the course, I hadn’t improved much. I was mad at myself for it, and it really affected my game. I shot a 38 on the front, which was just terrible. But I started to feel better on the back, and had a 32, so I managed to win by one stroke over Clayton Heafner. It was a good lesson, and fortunately not a very expensive one.

  To get back to my skill at being interviewed, I must have improved some, because when I won the Open in ’39, Trevor wrote, “Not only can Nelson play better—he’s also learned how to talk.” I guess I can thank Mr. Stanley Giles at Reading Country Club for quite a bit of that, and I’ll tell you more about him later. However, I must say that when I first talked with Mr. Trevor, I was mesmerized by his appearance. He had one good eye and a pretty sorry-looking patch over the other one, plus he kept a pipe in his mouth all the time, and he wasn’t just real careful about keeping his chin dry. I found myself staring at him, I’m afraid, instead of concentrating on answering his questions like I should have. But he was a wonderful golf writer, one who understood the game very well.

  When I played in the ’36 Open at Baltusrol, Paul Whiteman, the orchestra leader, was walking down the fairway with Louise and me and her sister, Delle, who was visiting us. Now there was of course a family resemblance between Delle and Louise, but to me it wasn’t all that strong. Anyway, Paul looked at both of them and said, “How in the world do you tell them apart?” I replied, “I’ve never had any trouble.” I didn’t mean anything by it, but something about the way I said it kind of upset Delle a little, and she never did let me forget it. I still had a lot to learn about women, I guess.

  My second-best finish in 1936 was at the General Brock Open in July. It was held on the Canadian side of Niagara Falls. I finished second and won $600. There we were, Louise and I, hundreds of miles from home, and the tournament committee decided to pay us in cash from the gate receipts. It was all in ones and fives and tens. We were so nervous about it, we stashed it in a dozen places all around the car that night till we could get home and put it in a bank. None of it was stolen, but we hid it so well that when we got home, we had an awful time trying to find it all. Fortunately, most all the tournaments paid by check, so we didn’t have any more stories like that to tell.

  Where they held the General Brock Open was such a small town, there was no place for people to stay, and we never had enough money then to stay in a nice hotel. We drove all over the place looking for a room, and finally in desperation Louise said, “Let’s try the hotel.” Since it was the General Brock Hotel that was sponsoring the tournament, she thought they might have special rates for the players. Sure enough, she was right—$2 a night. The bad part was that it was awfully hot, and the rooms had little or no cross-ventilation. Everyone was buying fans and ice and trying to keep cool any way they could think of. Air conditioning had only just been invented, so we had to put up with the heat and like it, most of the time.

  Besides finishing second and winning all that money, the General Brock Open was when I had my second big thrill in golf—playing with Walter Hagen. I was leading the tournament going into the final round, and I was paired with Hagen himself. Here he was, the golfer who’d once borrowed my cap when I was just a kid, and I was going to actually play golf with him. It was toward the end of his career, and he was more or less just making appearances by that time, but I still was very excited about it.

  They didn’t have any regulations about making your tee time back then, and Hagen was at least forty-five minutes late, which was a little unnerving. The tournament committee knew he was on his way to the course, but told me I had the right to play with a marker if I wanted to. But I thought it might be my only chance to ever play with Hagen, so I said I’d wait. He finally arrived, and never apologized for being
late, but said to me on the first tee, “I see you’ve been playing pretty well.” I said, “Thank you. I’m very pleased to get to play with you today.” Hagen himself didn’t play very well, but joked and laughed with the gallery as we went along.

  But the waiting had done something to me, or else I was just nervous playing with such a great champion, and I shot an awful 42 on the front, gathered myself together, and had a 35 on the back, which meant I ended up second. I didn’t have any bad feelings about Hagen or my decision to wait for him, though; it was worth it, and he really was a pleasure to play with. Besides, I should have had enough self-discipline to control myself and play my usual game. He had quite a bit of gallery, so between my fans and his, we had a good group. He never mentioned borrowing my cap all those years ago, and I didn’t bring it up, knowing he would have forgotten all about it. It was a great growing experience for me, to learn that a so-called celebrity like Hagen was really just a nice person, as most such folks are.

  In the fall of 1936, Louise and I drove back to Texarkana. She stayed with her folks while I went on a tour of the Pacific Northwest. I had to go alone, because we couldn’t afford train fare for Louise. I took the train and rode in an upper berth all the way.

  I played Vancouver, Victoria, Seattle, and Portland. In the first tournament, I’d been playing my irons beautifully, but not putting particularly well. In the last round, I hit the first five greens in a row, never farther than ten feet from the pin, and never made a single putt. I guess my frustration just got the better of me, because something just flashed over me, and I threw my putter up in some big old evergreen tree back of the green. I thought that putter never was going to come back down, but it finally did. There weren’t any people there, so no one was in danger, but I was really ashamed of myself. Then all of a sudden I started making birdies, one right after the other, shot 66, tied with Jimmy Thompson for first money, and won $975. Ken Black, an amateur who was the son of the pro at the club, won the tournament.