Nelson's first professional winter tour of California was, at best, a
learning experience. He lost his backer's money and had to hitch a ride
back to
Fort Worth. On his return he heard from the professional at
Texarkana, Ted
Longworth, that he was leaving to take up a similar
position at Waverly Country
Club in Portland, Ore., and that Byron
might like to apply for the vacancy. He
did, got the job and was able
to spend a lot of time honing his game. Eventually
Nelson was able to
afford to pay a young caddie to shag balls for him, one
Miller Barber,
barely into his teens at the time.
He was hardly more successful on his second sponsored California venture, but
Nelson salvaged a little for the wreck by finishing second to Wiffy Cox
in the
Texas Open at Breckenridge, and to Craig Wood in Galveston en
route home. These
late successes enabled him to pay back his
father-in-law to be and buy an
engagement ring for his first wife of 50
years, Louise.
Shortly before the Masters of 1937, Nelson secured his first job as a head
professional at Reading Country Club in Pennsylvania. He was fired up
about his
new job when he went to the Masters for the third time, but
he also needed to
make some money in order to be able to stock his shop
after the tournament.
Nelson opened with a fabulous round of 66.
Nelson followed with 72 and then 75, and after taking 38 shots to the turn on
the final day was three strokes behind Ralph Guldahl. On the back,
Nelson shot
32 to win by two shots. “Lord” Byron, as golf writer O.B.
Keeler christened him
that fateful day, had finally arrived in
world-class circles with the most
important of all of his 61
victories.
The year 1939 was a spectacular one for Nelson. He secured the head
professional's post at Iverness, being preferred over Ben Hogan. But
most
importantly, Nelson won the U.S. Open at Spring Mill on the
outskirts of
Philadelphia after two 18-hole playoffs, and by courtesy
of Sam Snead, who
finished with a notorious triple bogey when par would
have won the only major
title to have eluded him.
Nelson went on to win three more major titles, beating Snead for his first
PGA Championship victory in 1940, Hogan in an historic playoff in the
1942
Masters, and Sam Byrd in the final of the 1945 PGA Championship.
He was a member
of the victorious American Ryder Club team when the
matches were resumed after
World War II in 1947 in Portland, and
captained the team to victory at Royal
Birkdale in 1965.
When Nelson passed away in 2006, he was the game's elder statesman and
foremost gentleman, and his shadow continues to loom over golf, never
more so
than at his namesake PGA Tour stop at the recently refurbished
TPC Four Seasons
Las Colinas outside Dallas.
But it is the Streak of 1945 that will be Nelson's most enduring legacy, in
that it was so improbable. It all started in the second week of March
at the
Miami Fourball, at which stage Nelson trailed Snead 4-3 that
year in tournament
victories. Nelson and Jug McSpaden, his best friend
on tour and longtime
sparring partner, had never previously done well
in the tournament. But after
winning their four matches they were no
less than 21 holes up.
The end came anticlimactically when top-class international amateur
Freddie Haas put together an 18-under-par total of 270 to win the
Memphis Open,
with a very weary, now mistake-prone Nelson only tied for
fourth place at 276.
