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Nation's Top Senior Amateurs Invade Southampton
First InstallmentSecond InstallmentFourth Installment
With current USGA President Fred Ridley, left, lending a hand in 1977, the USA team shocked a confident GB&I squad at Shinnecock. (USGA Photo Archives)
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By David Shefter, USGA
Far Hills, N.J. -- It had been 67 years since a national championship had been conducted at Shinnecock Hills when the USGA Senior Amateur came calling to the Long Island club in 1967.
The 120 contestants received a warm welcome from the club's membership, but the same could not be said for Mother Nature. Near-hurricane conditions raged during much of the championship, which saw the highest stroke-play medalist score in the history of the event. J. Wolcott Brown, David Goldman and Ray Palmer shared the qualifying medal at 13-over 153, which to this day remains a record by two strokes over the 151 posted by John Procter and Bob Hullender at the 1992 Senior Amateur held at The Loxahatchee Club in Jupiter, Fla. The weather took its toll on defending champion Dexter Daniels, who failed to qualify for match play.
Palmer continued his strong play in match play, where he defeated Walter Bronson in the final, 3 and 2.
Not long after staging the Senior Amateur, club member Virgil Sherrill was approached by former U.S. Amateur champion and then-current PGA Tour Commissioner Deane Beman about the possibility of Shinnecock becoming the permanent home of the World Series of Golf. The club felt it wasn't equipped to handle an annual PGA Tour stop, even one with a limited field.
Yet the Walker Cup was a much smaller competition that didn't generate major logistical problems. In 1973, Sherrill wrote a letter to the USGA, inviting the Association to bring the 1977 Walker Cup to Shinnecock Hills. "We wanted the satisfaction of watching a group of very good players on what we consider one of the nation's best and most classic courses," wrote Sherrill.
In 1922, the inaugural Walker Cup Matches were held down the street from Shinnecock at The National Golf Links of America, a club founded and designed by C.B. Macdonald. The USA squad won that Match, 8-4, and in 24 subsequent playings, the USA had won all but three (one tie). Shinnecock was a natural selection as a Walker Cup site and it offered the Great Britain & Ireland side a solid chance of winning the Match for the first time on American soil.
For starters, the course's layout and feel was not unlike the many classic seaside links courses in Great Britain. And the GB&I team had more experience than its counterparts, led by reigning British Amateur champion Peter McEvoy, who would go on to captain the GB&I squad to victories over the USA at Nairn (1999) and Ocean Forest (2001). Also on the squad was future Masters and British Open champion Sandy Lyle. The team's captain, Sandy Sadler, had played on the 1965 squad that had tied the USA, 11-11, at Baltimore Country Club.
By contrast, the USA team was younger and considered unheralded, a far cry from the 1975 unit that featured future U.S. Open champions Curtis Strange and Jerry Pate. The lone USA veteran was 39-year-old Dick Siderowf, who had won the 1973 and 1976 British Amateur titles.
Siderowf was joined by Jay Sigel, who would eventually capture two U.S. Amateur and three U.S. Mid-Amateur titles, Fred Ridley, the 1975 U.S. Amateur champion and future member of the USGA's Executive Committee (he became the 58th USGA president on Feb. 7), and Scott Simpson, who would go on to win the 1987 U.S. Open and finish runner-up to Payne Stewart in an 18-hole playoff at the 1991 U.S. Open. Also on the team was John Fought, who would win the U.S. Amateur a week later and is now a successful golf course architect. Captaining the squad was Lew Oehmig, who was the oldest USGA champion until Marlene Streit surpassed him in September.
This led to the perception that, at least on paper, GB&I had the better team. "They don't look like much," said McEvoy prior to the competition. "I can't remember when I've been less impressed."
But, as they say, this is why they play the games. The "green" USA squad dominated from the outset, taking a 9-3 lead following the first day. It led to an easy 16-8 victory. The young group of Americans had proved their moxie that weekend, yet the ultimate victor was Shinnecock. No player on either side managed to break par for either the front or back nine in 16 singles matches. The golf course proved it could stand up to the elite amateurs of the game. And many, including those at the USGA, wanted to see how it stood up to the world's best.
That opportunity would come in 1986.
Part I: Founding USGA Member Shinnecock Hills Has Carved Place In Golf
Part II: Hoyt Catalyst In 1896 Women's Amateur Going To Shinnecock
Part IV: 100 Years Later, Shinnecock Still A Brute
David Shefter is a staff writer for the USGA. E-mail him at dshefter@usga.org with questions or comments.
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