Golf is a game with incredible staying power, having been played for over 500 years. Men and women; young and old; royalty and artisans; CEOs and taxi drivers; people with bad backs and creaky knees; amputees and the blind, all play it. A few even play from wheelchairs. What is it that draws people to golf and holds them in its grip until they are too old and feeble to play any longer? The reasons are many. The game engages both body and mind in a very particular way, and some might argue, the soul as well.
The people in my book never quit, even when things looked bleak. Bobby Jones claimed that golf “is the most rewarding of all games because it possesses a very definite value as a molder or developer of character.” It was character which guided these people’s lives and girded them against persistent struggles in the face of adversity that threatened their very lives.
Harry Vardon was at the peak of his game when struck down with tuberculosis, but he resolved to play on, winning two more British Opens, and acting as a mentor to promising new players; Bobby Jones was stricken with a rare and debilitating spinal disease that would confine him to a wheelchair when he was still a young man, but he kept building the Masters Tournament, writing about golf, and being an ambassador for the game; Ben Hogan nearly died in a car crash that permanently damaged his body and caused him chronic pain for the rest of his days, but he came back and won six more major championships, and built a company bearing his name.
Babe Didrikson Zaharias was struck down by colon cancer but wouldn’t quit. She became a spokesperson for the American Cancer Society and was an inspiration to fellow sufferers, especially after winning another Women’s U.S. Open before the cancer returned; Charlie Sifford was the victim of incessant racism which included harassment and death threats, but he never bowed, and was a winner at the highest levels of the game, paving the way for the likes of Tiger Woods.
Ken Venturi lost his game after a car accident and later to carpal tunnel syndrome, but would capture the U.S. Open in some of the most trying conditions the championship ever produced and later have a successful broadcasting career; Bruce Edwards was afflicted with ALS, or “Lou Gehrig’s disease,” but kept going and inspired people with his fight, carrying the bag for one final major victory with boss Tom Watson before succumbing to his illness. What kept them going? They all loved the game. It was what they did.
“However mean your life is, meet it and live it.” These words of Henry David Thoreau could describe the lives of all the people in this book, who faced tremendous physical and emotional trials in their lives, yet persevered and overcame.