Golf with Which Is Incorporated "Golfing," Established 1*01
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MR. JOHN G. ANDERSON AND MR. JEROME D. TRAVERS Runner-up and Winner of the Amateur Championship otn bj I'icl -i k. r, SI. Louis) GOLF WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED "GOLFING," ESTABLISHED 1*01 VOL. XXXIII OCTOBER. 1913 No. 4 THE AMATEUR CHAMPIONSHIP BY BERNARD DARWIN HE National Amateur Champion- was up and toiling across the course, ship was played at Garden City which was still wet with dew, towards froTm Sept. 1-6. I spent a most delight- the fourteenth tee. to behold a spectacle, ful and interesting week—my first in to British eyes, quite unique. The roll- America—watching it, and have tried call was solemnly called, and sixteen to set down some account of what I heroes responded, one sluggard appar- saw. At the end, I have ventured to ently preferring his bed. The players add, not without much trepidation, some were then dispatched in parties of four brief impressions of American golf and to play the fourteenth hole. Of the first golfers, as seen through British spec- four, two drove from the tee with tacles. wooden and two with iron clubs, and I The championship began on Monday rejoice to say that it was the two brave with the first round of the qualifying men that got the 4's. In the second competition. There were several fine batch there were two 4's, in the third rounds played, noticeably the 76's of only one, and in the fourth three. Three Mr. Travis and Mr. Byers, and the 75 gallant 4's thev were, too, for no single of Mr. Ouimet, who thus early gave the man was actually on the green in his field a taste of his quality. Mr. Travis second shot, and there was some cour- was not holing long putts in quite the ageous pitching and putting. diabolical way he did at Sandwich in Of the sixteen, eight were now safe, 190-1, but the beautiful accuracy of his and two who had taken six or more were shots up to the green was just as im- irretrievably dead. Six remained to pressive as ever, and from start to finish play off for one place, and the fifteenth he never looked capable of hitting a hole against the wind, with dewy grass, crooked shot. Mr. Evans kept him- made a searching test. Four died the self well in the running with a 77, death, but Mr. Bowers and Mr. Mar- while Mr. Travers gave one of his va- ston both got fine 4's. Mr. Marston hol- riety entertainments, playing abomin- ing a nasty curly down-hill putt amid ably ill on the way out and superbly much applause. The struggle ended at well on the way home, his score being the sixteenth, though in an unexpected 44, 35—79. At the end of the day it way. After three shots, Mr. Marston was discovered that seventeen players lay apparently dead, Mr. Bowers eight had tied for the last nine places in the or nine feet away; Mr. Bowers holed 64, but the shades of night had fallen out, Mr. Marston missed, and the tale too far and too fast for the ties to be of nine was complete. played off that night. In the second qualifying round, Mr. At half-past eight next morning, I Travis again played admirably for 76, Copyright, 1913, by CLIFFORD L. TURNER. All rights reserved. •J:;S THE AMATEUR CHAMPIONSHIP and Mr. Onimet showing plenty of bunker, where Mr. Kerr soon joined nerve and stamina did 7(i also, and him. After this came a sequence of tluis led Mr. Travis on the two rounds successful pitches broken only by the by a single stroke. He seemed likely unfortunate Mr. Schmidt, who in this to win the medal, but Mr. "Chick" championship certainly did not live up Evans was behind him in one of his to the reputation he won so worthily at brilliant moods; '39 to the turn was St. Andrews. Some demon entering nothing superhuman, but with his nose into him untimely caused him to lay towards home and lunch, Mr. Evans aside his mashie and take a much lofted went bersak. He had six ,'5's where niblick. With this club lie tried, quite no respectable man has a right to more unnecessarily, to get right under the than two, and finished in S2} thus mak- ball, but got under a vast divot instead, ing his score 71 and his total for the and the ball went with the "sickening the two days 1 18—a great achievement. thud" of the halfpenny novelette into Meanwhile, Mr. Travers was keeping the bunker. The contest now became his supporters on tenter-hooks by tak- one between Mr. Schmidt and Mr. Ul- ing an unconscionable number for the nier. Mr. Schmidt's first effort out of first nine holes; then he pulled himself the bunker sent the ball hurling against together and played so heroically that the timber, whence it rebounded play- he arrived on the last tee with a three fully some sixty yards backwards over I for 82, which would have made him as his head; the next put it gently into safe as a church. He had to wait some the bunker again, the next being the while watching Mr. Byers performing fifth in all landed it on the green. Mr. prodigies of ineffectual valor with his Ulmer now becomes temporarily the niblick in the bunker to the left of the hero of the story; his first niblick shot green, and this sight must have had some left the ball where it was before, and hideous mesmeric influence, for when his second sent it scuttling over the green into the rough grass beyond. Mr. his turn came to play, the ball flew Schmidt holed out in two putts, making straight into the heart of the very same seven shots in all, so that Mr. Ulmer bunker. This is really a desperate had two strokes to beat him. The first bunker with precipitous sides and was lamentably short and a prolonga- plenty of cheerful heel marks at the tion of the agony seemed likely, but he bottom of it, and it came near to giv- holed out with rare nerve and so se- ing America a new champion. Mr. cured the vacant place. It was hard Travers only got out at the third at- luck for Mr. Schmidt, but assuredly tempt: three putts swelled the total to that second shot of his deserved what seven and he was in the direst jeopardy. Ultimately he tied with ten others at it got. 165, and these eleven poor wretches, THE FIRST ROUND. among whom were Mr. Robert Wat- In the first round of eighteen holes, son and Mr. Schmidt, came out to play only two matches deserve particular off the tie for ten places. They played notice: Mr. Herreshoff vs. Mr. Gard- the first hole together, and, but for its ner, and Mr. Travers vs. Mr. Watson. tragic ending, this hole was the joke Mr. Gardner is one of the most power- of the world. After the tee shots, the ful hitters with any kind of iron club course looked as if there had been a that I have ever seen, and though one small local snowstorm, for nine balls would hardly describe him perhaps as a out of the eleven lay on the fair-green. finished golfer, he is a very formidable Of the other two, Mr. Perrin got his person, and Mr. Herreshoff did well to ball out of the rough in two, and beat him by three and two. The couple pitched onto the green in three, trust- began at the tenth hole and were still ing very wisely to the subsequent indis- square when the club-house was reached. cretions of others. Mr. Ulmer tried Then Mr. Herreshoff began to play like too much, and planted his ball in the the proverbial giant refreshed. He laid THE AMATEUR CHAMPIONSHIP 239 his approach within four feet of the on his shoulders. Mr. Travers did not first hole and got down his putt for get a hole back till the seventeenth, three; he just missed a two at the sec- when Mr. Watson missed a very short ond hole by the merest shade, and then putt; but when once the holes began at the third he played a masterly pitch to come back, they came back with a from the rough, struck the pin, and run, and at the tenth hole Mr. Travers lay six inches away. Thus he was 3 was 1 up. He won the eleventh and up, and never letting go his advantage, twelfth, lost the thirteenth, won the won easily enough. fourteenth and fifteenth, and so the If Mr. Herreshoffs first three holes match, by 4 and S—really a wonderful Mr. Heinrich Schmidt playing his fifth shot from bunker at first hole in play- off of tie in the second qualifying round were dramatic, Mr. Robert Watson's feat under the circumstances. He is were melodramatic, for he went one truly a terrible player with his back to better: he did them in 8, 2, 3, and Mr. the wall. Travers, who had played par golf for THE SECOND ROUND. 4, 3, 4, found himself 3 down. Three In the second round, two matches down with only 15 to go constitutes obviously single themselves out for what the Duke of Wellington once notice above all the others: Mr. Trav- called a "damned awkward \ predica- ers and Mr.