Ben Hogan

From Encyclopedia Jr, free information reference for Kids

Ben Hogan on the cover of the DVD Ben Hogan: The Golf Swing (2003). In the lower left picture he is holding the Claret Jug.

William Ben Hogan (August 13, 1912 – July 25, 1997) was one of the greatest professional golfers ever to have played the game. Born within six months of two of the other acknowledged greats of the 20th century, Sam Snead and Byron Nelson, Hogan is also notable for his profound influence on golf swing theory and his legendary ball striking ability, for which he is still renowned among players and fans.

[edit] Early Life and Character

Born in Stephenville, Texas, he began caddying at the age of eleven and started as a professional golfer in 1931. Hogan was, by most accounts, the greatest golfer of his time, and still stands as one of the greatest of all time.

"The Hawk" possessed fierce determination and an iron will, which, when combined with his unquestionable golf skills, formed an aura which itself could intimidate opponents into submission. Hogan's legend also records that he was known as "The Wee Ice Man", or, in some versions, the "Wee Ice Mon". This phrase is thought to have been coined in Scotland during his famous British Open victory at Carnoustie in 1953, and is a reference to his steely and, by that time, seemingly nerveless demeanor, itself a product of a golf swing he had built that was designed to perform better the more pressure he put it under. Hogan rarely spoke while in competition, and few opponents could avoid wilting under his icy glare.

[edit] The "Hogan Slam" Season

The win at Carnoustie was but a part of Hogan's watershed 1953 season, in which he won five of the six tournaments he entered and the first three major championships of the year (a feat known as the "Hogan Slam". It still stands among the greatest single seasons in the history of professional golf. Hogan was unable to enter — and possibly win — the 1953 PGA Championship (to complete the Grand Slam) because its play (July 1-7) overlapped the play of the British Open at Carnoustie (July 6-10), which he won. His nine career professional Major Championships tie him (with Gary Player) for fourth all-time, trailing only Jack Nicklaus (18), Tiger Woods (12) and Walter Hagen (11).

[edit] Career Threatening Accident

Between the years of 1938 through 1959, Hogan won 63 professional golf tournaments despite his career being interrupted in its prime by World War II and a near-fatal car accident. Hogan and his wife, Valerie, ran head-on into a bus on a fog-shrouded highway east of Van Horn, Texas in the winter of 1949.

This accident left Hogan with a double-fracture of the pelvis, a fractured collar bone, a left ankle fracture, a chipped rib, and near-fatal blood clots, he would suffer lifelong circulation problems and other physical limitations. His doctors said he might never walk again, let alone play golf competitively.

[edit] Hogan's Golf Swing

Ben Hogan is widely acknowledged to have been the greatest ball striker ever to have played golf. Although he had a formidable record as a tournament winner, it is this aspect of Hogan which mostly underpins his modern reputation.

Hogan was known to practice more than any other golfer of his contemporaries and is said to have "invented practice". He was also one of the first players to match particular clubs to yardages, or references points around the course such as bunkers or trees, in order to improve his distance control.

Hogan thought that an individual's golf swing was "in the dirt" and that mastering it required plenty of practice and repetition. He is also known to have spent years contemplating the golf swing, trying a range of theories and methods before arriving at the finished method which brought him his greatest period of success.

The young Hogan was badly afflicted by hooking the golf ball. Although slight of build at only 5'7" and 140 pounds (64 kg), attributes that earned him the nickname "Bantam", which he thoroughly disliked, he was very long off the tee early in his career, and even competed in long drive contests.

It has been alleged that Hogan used a "strong" grip, with hands more the right of the club grip in tournament play prior to his accident in 1949, despite often practising with a "weak" grip, with the back of the left wrist facing the target, and that this limited his success, or, at least, his reliability, up to that date (source: John Jacobs in his book 'Fifty Greatest Golf Lessons of the Century').

Jacobs alleges that Byron Nelson told him this information, and furthermore that Hogan developed and used the "strong" grip as a boy in order to be able to hit the ball as far as bigger, stronger contemporaries. This strong grip is what resulted in Hogan hitting the odd disastrous snap hook. Nelson and Hogan both grew up in Fort Worth, and they are known to have played against each other as teenagers.

Hogan's late swing produced the famed "Hogan Fade" ball flight, lower than usual for a great player and from left to right. This ball flight was the result of his using a "draw" type swing in conjunction with a "weak" grip, a combination which all but negated the chance of hitting a hook.

It greatly improved Hogan's accuracy but may have cost him some length. Certainly during his period of greatness Hogan was among the short to mid-length hitting professionals.

[edit] Hogan's Secret

Hogan is thought to have developed a "secret" which made his swing nearly automatic. His "secret", a special wrist movement, known as "cupping under", was revealed in a 1955 Life magazine article, but many believed Hogan did not reveal all that he knew. It has since been alleged, in Golf Digest magazine that the second element of Hogan's secret was the way in which he used his right knee to initiate the swing and, furthermore, that this right knee movement was critical to the correct operation of the wrist.

Ben Hogan's enduring influence on golf instruction is illustated by the title of this book, The Fundamentals of Hogan (2000) by the leading contemporary golf instructor David Leadbetter.

[edit] "Five Fundamentals" and Golf Instruction

Hogan believed that a solid, repeatable golf swing involved only a few essential elements, which, when performed correctly and in sequence, were the essence of the swing. His book Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf is perhaps the most widely-read golf tutorial ever written, although Harvey Penick's "Little Red Book" would also have a claim to that title, and the principles therein are often parroted by modern "swing gurus".

Ben Hogan's Modern Fundamentals: The Five Lessons of Golf was initially released as a five part series beginning in the March 1957 issue of Sports Illustrated magazine, and was printed in book form later in that same year. It is currently in its 64th printing. Even today it continues to maintain a place at or near the top of the Amazon.com golf book sales rankings. The book was co-authored by Herbert Warren Wind, and illustrated by artist Anthony Ravielli.

[edit] Ball Striking Ability

Hogan is widely acknowledged to have been the best ball striker ever.

His only rival for this title is the remarkable Canadian professional Moe Norman, whose method was totally unorthodox by comparison but equally effective.

Hogan's ball striking has been described as being of near miraculous calibre by very knowledgeable observers such as Jack Nicklaus, who only saw him play some years after his prime, but responded to the question; "Is Tiger Woods the best ball striker you have ever seen?" by answering, "No, no - Ben Hogan, easily" (Golf Digest, April 2004).

Further testimony to Hogan's (and Norman's) status among top golfers is provided by Tiger Woods, who recently said that he wished to "own his (golf) swing" in the same way as Moe Norman and Hogan had. Woods claimed that this pair were the only players ever to have "owned their swings", in that they had total control of it and, as a result, of the ball's flight (Golf Digest, January 2005).

Although his ball striking was perhaps the greatest ever, Hogan is also known to have at times been a very poor putter by professional standards, particularly on slow greens.

Although he suffered from the "yips" in his later years, Hogan was known as an effective putter from mid to short range on quick, US Open style surfaces during his career.

[edit] Career and Records

In 1948 alone, Ben Hogan won 10 tournaments, including the U.S. Open at Riviera Country Club, a course known as "Hogan's Alley" because of his success there. Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth, a modern PGA tournament venue, is also known as "Hogan's Alley" and may have the better claim to the nickname. Hogan's Alley is also the name of an FBI training complex, and the term has its origins in the late 19th century in the form of a cartoon strip, only later being matched with courses at which Hogan excelled. The sixth hole at Carnoustie, a par five the tee of which Hogan took a famously difficult line off during each his rounds in the 1953 Open Championship, has also recently been renamed Hogan's Alley.

Prior to the 1949 accident, Hogan never truly captured the hearts of his galleries, despite being one of the better golfers of his time. Perhaps this was due to his cold and aloof on-course persona. But when Ben Hogan shocked and amazed the golf world by returning to tournament golf only 11 months after his accident, and, amazingly, took second place in the 1950 Los Angeles Open after a playoff loss to Sam Snead, he was cheered on by ecstatic fans. "His legs simply were not strong enough to carry his heart any longer," famed sportswriter Grantland Rice said of Hogan's near-miss. However, he proved to his critics (and to himself, especially) that he could still win by completing his famous comeback five months later, defeating Lloyd Mangrum and George Fazio in an 18-hole playoff at Merion Golf Club to win his second U.S. Open Championship. Hogan went on to achieve what is perhaps the greatest sporting accomplishment in history, limping to 12 more PGA Tour wins (including 6 majors) before retiring. 1951 saw the release of a biopic starring Glenn Ford as Hogan, called Follow the Sun: The Ben Hogan Story. [1] He even received a ticker-tape parade in New York City upon his return from winning the 1953 British Open Championship, the only time he played the event.

Hogan played on two U.S. Ryder Cup teams, 1947 and 1951, and captained the team three times, 1947, 1949, and 1967, famously claiming on the latter occasion to have brought the "twelve best golfers in the world" to play in the competition. This line was used by subsquent Ryder Cup captain Raymond Floyd in 1989, although on that occasion the United States was beaten by Team Europe at The Belfry.

Hogan won the Vardon Trophy for lowest scoring average three times: 1940, 1941, and 1948. In 1953, Hogan won the Hickok Belt as the top professional athlete of the year in the United States.

Ben Hogan later went on to found a golf club manufacturing company (now owned by the Callaway Golf Company), and his clubs, or at least ones that carry his name, are still played today. Unlike the great players of the 1960's and 1970's, Ben Hogan never competed on the senior golf tour, as that circuit did not exist until he was in his late sixties.

He was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 1974. In 1976, Ben Hogan was voted the Bob Jones Award, the highest honor given by the United States Golf Association in recognition of distinguished sportsmanship in golf. He died in Fort Worth, Texas.

[edit] PGA Tour wins (64)

• 1938 (1) Hershey Four-Ball (with Vic Ghezzi)
• 1940 (4) North and South Open, Greater Greensboro Open, Asheville Land of the Sky Open, Goodall Palm Beach Round Robin
• 1941 (5) Asheville Open, Chicago Open, Hershey Open, Miami Biltmore International Four-Ball (with Gene Sarazen), Inverness Four-Ball (with Jimmy Demaret)
• 1942 (6) Los Angeles Open, San Francisco Open, North and South Open, Asheville Land of the Sky Open, Hale America Open, Rochester Open
• 1945 (5) Nashville Invitational, Portland Open Invitational, Richmond Invitational, Montgomery Invitational, Orlando Open
• 1946 (13) Phoenix Open, San Antonio Texas Open, St. Petersburg Open, Colonial National Invitation, Western Open, Winnipeg Open, Golden State Open, Dallas Invitational, North and South Open, Goodall Round Robin, PGA Championship, Miami International Four-Ball (with Jimmy Demaret), Inverness Four-Ball (with Jimmy Demaret)
• 1947 (7) Los Angeles Open, Phoenix Open, Colonial National Invitation, Chicago Victory Open, World Championship of Golf, Miami International Four-Ball (with Jimmy Demaret), Inverness Round Robin Four-Ball (with Jimmy Demaret)
• 1948 (10) Los Angeles Open, PGA Championship, U.S. Open, Inverness Round Robin Four-Ball (with Jimmy Demaret), Motor City Open, Reading Open, Western Open, Denver Open, Reno Open, Glendale Open
• 1949 (2) Bing Crosby Pro-Am, Long Beach Open
• 1950 (1) U.S. Open
• 1951 (3) The Masters, U.S. Open, World Championship of Golf
• 1952 (1) Colonial National Invitation
• 1953 (5) The Masters, Pan American Open, Colonial National Invitation, U.S. Open, The Open Championship (designated as a PGA Tour win in 2002)
• 1959 (1) Colonial National Invitation

Major championships are shown in bold.

[edit] Results in major championships

NT = No tournament
DNP = Did not play
CUT = missed the half-way cut
"T" indicates a tie for a place
Green background for wins. Yellow background for top-10

[edit] Trivia

• Ben Hogan never had a competitive hole in one. Sharon Ray, his longtime secretary, claims Hogan never made one in leisure play, either. Author Jim Dodson [2] says that Hogan stopped aiming at the cup because in the early days, pins were made of hickory so when Hogan hit the flagstick, the ball would bounce off the green. Flagsticks were also considerably thicker in width in Hogan's day and thus they were less likely to admit a ball when in place.

• At age 9, Hogan's father Chester committed suicide. By some accounts Chester committed suicide in front of him, which some (including Hogan biographer James Dodson) have cited as the cause of his introverted personality in later years. [3]

• Though many accounts hold that Hogan was born left-handed, he wrote right-handed, and specifically denied this story in a 1987 interview: "No, that's one of those things that's always been written, but it's an absolute myth."

• On the HBO television series Curb Your Enthusiasm (Episode 50: The End), Larry David meets Hogan during his brief visit in Heaven.

[edit] See also

• Golfers with most PGA Tour wins
• Golfers with most wins in men's major championships
• Most PGA Tour wins in a year
• Longest PGA Tour Win Streaks

[edit] External links

• Ben Hogan Photos By A Ravielli Taken For The 5 Lessons of Golf
• Ben Hogan at Golf Stars Online Directory of relevant online Hogan resources
• Ben Hogan on About.com Profile, stats and quotes
• Ben Hogan Profile at Golf Legends