BOB JONES LOOKS BACK ON 1930
One of the unintentional by-products of the intense concentration required in competitive golf is that many golfers effortlessly remember most of the strokes they have played in important championships as if it all happened yesterday. This is certainly true of Bob Jones. In this second and concluding part of the Grand Slam anniversary album, Bob recalls an important moment in each of the four championships he won that epochal year.
"This was a most important shot in the British Amateur Championship of 1980, and it came on the 4th hole of my match against Syd Roper. I had been told that Roper was a mediocre player, but I had been impressed with the way he hit the hall off the first tee. I managed to start with two birdies on the first three hole, and in this picture I am holing a pitch of about 140 yard from the Cottage Bunker on the 4th hole for an eagle two. This gave me a three-hole lead, which I never substantially increased. Roper turned out to be a very good golfer and fine competitor, and I might have been in serious trouble without such a start."
"This is the shot that wrapped up the British Open of 1980. Going for the green on the par-five 16th at Hoylake in the last round, my second barely reached a pot bunker at the left corner of the green. Just before I left the States, Horton Smith had given me one of the first sand wedges. I had carried it in my bag but had never used it. With the necessity for planting my right foot on the rear wall of the bunker, the wedge seemed the only possible club with which this shot could be played, so I decided to risk it. The ball came up nicely in a flat trajectory and proceeded some 50 feet across a fast green until it stopped at the very edge of the hole. The resulting four was just the necessary margin, since Leo Diegel I who finished two stroke behind me) later made a six from this same bunker."
"A fine reception in New York after my return from Great Britain in 1930. The picture recall to me a letter I received not long ago from an unknown friend who wrote that he had found himself on the Battery while the parade was forming. He approached one of New York's Finest, sweltering in his heavy uniform, and asked what the parade was for. 'Oh,' said the policeman, in obvious disgust, 'for some damned golf player.' My wife and Joe Johnston are on the back seat with me, and the late John S. Cohen, then publisher of the Atlanta Journal, is the smiling gentleman on the front seat."
"This is the final putt of about 40 feet on the last green at Interlachen in the United States Open Championship of 1930. I had just taken five at the 17th for the third double bogie of the round, SO even with the five-stroke lead with which I had started the afternoon play, I really needed this putt to make me safe from pursuit by the two Smiths, Macdonald and Horton. When the ball topped the rise seen in the picture and took the break directly toward the center of the hole, I think it was one of the most beautiful sights I hare ever seen on a golf course."
"This was the final hole in the final match of the United States Amateur Championship of 1930. The hole was a drive and short pitch to a small green just over a lovely brook. The shot had to be played quite steeply in order to hold the green. Rex, my caddie, was one of the nicest youngsters and one of the best caddies I have ever had assigned to me."
FIVE PHOTOS
