EDITOR’S LETTER E New book honours legacy of Bobby Locke
U nless you’re a member at Parkview Golf Club, or have been in the company of Denis Hutchinson and Dale Hayes lately, there is little to remind us today of a South African who won the claret jug four times at the Open Championship. So I was delighted to receive a copy of a new book by Grant Winter on the one and only Bobby Locke. Titled Prince of Putters , it’s an unusual book in that it has been compiled by Winter, former golf writer for The Star, from a pile of press cuttings, photographs, cartoons and scorecards left him by Bobby’s widow Mary Locke when she died in 2000. Mary, and Bobby’s parents, had carefully collected these during Locke’s life – he first made headlines as a 9-year-old in 1927 in the Johannesburg newspapers – which ended in 1987 at age 69. His last round had been at Parkview two days earlier, and there is a statue of him outside the clubhouse. “Hutchy” was a pall-bearer at the funeral. “Bobby died at 69 because he was always determined to break 70.” The book, self-published by Winter, is a rarity because while Locke wrote his own autobiography in the 1950s, nothing of this substance (298 pages) has been written about him since. Encapsulating his career, it’s full of short stories, packed with interesting and funny anecdotes. What I liked
too were the numerous illustrations, adverts, old photos and newspaper pages. Local cartoonists of that era, Jock Leyden and Bob Connolly, sketched caricatures of him that graced newspapers and magazines. South Africans in the 1940s and 50s were proud of Bobby’s achievements – including nine SA Open victories – but unlike Gary Player, known as The Black Knight, and Ernie Els, The Big Easy, he collected some uncomplimentary monikers, notably from the American press who mocked his swing and didn’t take kindly to his successes over their star players on what was to become the PGA Tour. Old Muffin Face was one of them, and how about the Zoot-Knickered Clouter? That was a reference to the plus-fours he wore, along with linen dress shirts, buckskin shoes and a trademark white cap. English golf writer Peter Dobereiner described Locke on the course as having “the stately air of an archbishop conducting a funeral.” The book discusses the shock banning of Locke from American tournaments in 1949. There’s a quote from legendary American sports writer Grantland Rice: “Locke made the mistake of winning too many tournaments. The PGA has left a general impression it was afraid of Locke’s skill.” Stuart McLean stuart@morecorp.co.za
Prince of Putters is R290 and can be ordered by emailing grantwinter1950@gmail.com
Golf Digest SA will again be publishing the annual Top 100 Course rankings in our May issue. The first Top 50 rankings appeared in the January 1998 issue of GDSA, and that list grew to 100 in 2002. The last GDSA rankings were in 2018, before the print magazine’s closure at the end of that year. For the past four years these rankings have been the preserve of the SA Top 100 Courses website, where information and the history of 150 golf clubs is maintained. They will be announced in both Golf Digest and the website at the end of April.
EDITOR STUART MCLEAN DESIGN ELINORE DE LISLE MEDIA SALES RICHARD ROWE
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