Jan. 5, 2005 – Arnold Palmer, the father of modern golf, explains the birth of the majors in his foreword to The Majors 2005, the fourth edition of which will be published in February.

Palmer, who won seven Majors, writes: “The idea of a modern professional version of the Grand Slam first occurred to me while flying from New York to Dublin, Ireland, in late June of 1960. I had won the Masters Tournament that year in April in Augusta, Georgia, and just a few days earlier I had completed a victory in the United States Open Championship at Cherry Hills Country Club in Denver, Colorado.

“At the time I was bound for the Canada Cup (the forerunner to the World Cup) at Ireland’s Portmarnock Golf Club, where Sam Snead and I would represent the United States, and from there I was scheduled to go on to the Open Championship, when its centenary would be celebrated on the Old Course at St Andrews, Scotland. Traveling with me were my wife, Winnie, my father, a family friend, and Bob Drum, a reporter from our local newspaper, the Pittsburgh Press. The newspaper would not pay Bob’s expenses for the trip, but he took a vacation and came anyway.

“We were all looking forward to the trip with much anticipation, especially Winnie. I became a professional shortly after winning the U.S. Amateur Championship in 1954, and as a result we had missed out on the trip to St Andrews in 1955 for the Walker Cup Match. I also had in my mind to play in the Open Championship for a long time, if for no other reason than that Bobby Jones had felt such a powerful kinship with the people of St Andrews and the oldest major golf tournament in the world.

“All my life I had heard about Jones and the Grand Slam – which occurred the year after I was born – when in 1930 Jones won the Open and Amateur championships of Britain and the United States. I called him ‘Mr. Jones’ when I came to know him while playing in his tournament, the Masters, and I was very aware and respectful of him and his accomplishments.

“During the cocktail hour on that flight to Ireland, Drum and I began talking about Jones and how the growth of the professional game had effectively ended the Grand Slam concept as it pertained to the Open and Amateur championships.

“ ‘Well,’ I said casually over my drink, ‘why don’t we create a new Grand Slam?’ ‘Drum glared at me, almost as if he were annoyed, and muttered, what the hell are you talking about?’ ‘I explained what I was thinking: What would be wrong with a professional Grand Slam involving the Masters, both Open championships and the PGA Championship.” The rest is history. Palmer’s idea became golf’s flagship and the past and present are chronicled in Alun Evans’ book.

He gives the top players from each tournament since Willie Park Sr. won the first British Open at Prestwick in 1860. The records of some 2000 players who have finished in the top thirty in one of the four tournaments are detailed along with the most comprehensive set of records anywhere.

This data is put concisely into context each year with a story connected to all of the 391 Majors to date. The acclaimed book was also published in 1998, 1999 and 2002. The price for the next edition has been pegged at £14.99.

The Golf Majors 2005 is published by SportsBooks.

Contact:
Randall Northam
SportsBooks Ltd,
PO Box 422,
Cheltenham,
GL50 2YN, UK
+44 (0) 1242 256755.