Editor’s Note: With the CGA celebrating the 100th anniversary of its founding in 1915, this is the 10th monthly installment of a series of stories looking back on the last century of golf in Colorado. All the articles are being published on coloradogolf.org. This chapter focuses on the period from 2005-present. For the previous installments, CLICK HERE

When it comes to big-time golf tournaments being held in Colorado, the last decade has certainly had its ups and downs.

And many of the “ups” may have largely been the result of the biggest “down”.

The dominoes began to fall early in 2007. That was when Jack Vickers, founder of The International and of Castle Pines Golf Club, and PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem announced at a Denver-based press conference that The International’s run in Colorado was ending after 21 consecutive years on the PGA Tour.

Though there were many contributing reasons, the lack of a title sponsor in the final years of the event played a major role. The tournament hadn’t had a title or presenting sponsor after 2002. Tiger Woods seldom playing in the event — he competed in 1998 and ’99 only — was another factor, as were problems with the tournament’s dates.

But whatever the case, there was a sense of mourning on the Colorado sports scene. The International had produced champions such as Phil Mickelson (twice), Davis Love III (twice), Greg Norman, Ernie Els and Vijay Singh. Among the many other giants of the game to have played at Castle Pines were Jack Nicklaus (designer of Castle Pines GC), Woods and Arnold Palmer.

And the event produced some incredible golf, including in 2002, when one of the most amazing finishes in Colorado golf history occurred. Ten points out of the lead with five holes left, Steve Lowery went birdie-eagle-bogey-double eagle in a four-hole stretch, twice holing out from the fairway during that run. Only an eagle at the 17th hole by Rich Beem and Lowery’s missed birdie putt on 18 kept Lowery from carting off the trophy.

With the International’s exit, for the first calendar year since 1971, Colorado was left without a PGA, LPGA or Champions Tour event in 2007.

But as it turned out, the void was largely filled, and the last decade has been full of top-level spectator events.

— Before 2005, the U.S. Women’s Open had been held in Colorado just once — at 1995 at The Broadmoor, with Annika Sorenstam winning. But twice in the seven-year period from 2005 through 2001, the Centennial State would host the top tournament in women’s golf.

Birdie Kim won the 2005 championship in spectatcular fashion at Cherry Hills Country Club, holing out for — what else, given her name — birdie from a deep greenside bunker on the 72nd hole.

Six years later, at The Broadmoor’s East Course, another South Korean, So Yeon Ryu (left, in orange), prevailed, winning in the first three-hole aggregate playoff in the tournament’s history. Like Sorenstam at The Broadmoor and Kim at Cherry Hills, Ryu made the U.S. Women’s Open her first LPGA Tour victory.

Both the 2005 and ’11 Women’s Opens in Colorado drew more than 130,000 spectators for the week.

–The Broadmoor attracted a similar number for the 2008 U.S. Senior Open, won by Eduardo Romero of Argentina. That tournament is remembered for the black bear that ran across a fairway in which Bernhard Langer was playing. And then there was the presence of then-celebrity couple Greg Norman and Chris Evert …

— Colorado would go on to host two Champions Tour majors in three years as the 2010 Senior PGA Championship came to Colorado Golf Club, with Tom Lehman claiming the title.

— In 2012, the U.S. Amateur came to Cherry Hills for the second time — Phil Mickelson’s win in 1990 being the first — with CommonGround Golf Course serving as the second stroke-play venue. Steven Fox won the championship this time in one of Jordan Spieth’s final amateur events.

— In 2013, the Solheim Cup — the female version of the Ryder Cup — came to the western U.S. for the first time, with Colorado Golf Club being the host. The Europeans (left) won the Cup on U.S. soil for the first time. The 18-10 score marked the largest final margin in the history of the event.

— And then in 2014, the PGA Tour returned to Colorado for the first time since 2006, with Cherry Hills hosting the BMW Championship, the penultimate event of the FedEx Cup Playoffs. Billy Horschel won the tournament en route to claiming the 2014 FedEx Cup title.

The 2014 BMW Championship (pictured at top, with Rory McIlroy competing at Cherry Hills) was later named the PGA Tour’s Tournament of the Year for the third straight season. With University of Colorado Evans Scholar alum George Solich serving as general chairman, the event raised a record $3.5 million for the Evans Scholars.

— And, looking ahead, another major spectator event is on tap for the state as the 2018 U.S. Senior Open will be contested at The Broadmoor the same year as the resort turns 100 years old.

Here are some of the other Colorado golf highlights of the period from 2005 to present:

— Two distinguished Colorado PGA golf professionals, Warren Smith and Charles “Vic” Kline, were both inducted into the PGA Golf Professional Hall of Fame in 2005.

— In 2005, the CGA and CWGA officially purchased the former Lowry golf course, the site of the present-day CommonGround Golf Course.

— Rick DeWitt became the oldest (at age 50) winner of the CGA Les Fowler Player of the Year Award, in 2006.

— In 2006, the Walking Stick course in Pueblo hosted the U.S. Women’s Amateur Public Links Championship, with Tiffany Joh defeating Kimberly Kim in the final.

— In 2007, former University of Colorado athlete Hale Irwin won his record 45th Champions Tour event — 16 more than the No. 2 player on the list, Lee Trevino.

— In 2008, Murphy Creek Golf Course in Aurora was the site of the U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship, with Jack Newman earning the title. Among the other competitors were Rickie Fowler and Billy Horschel.

— The Tom Doak-designed CommonGround Golf Course, originally owned and operated by both the CGA and CWGA, opened in 2009, marking the last new 18-hole course to come on the scene in Colorado. A nine-hole Kids Course also opened, thanks in significant part to a $175,000 grant from the USGA. The Kids Course is largely used for junior golf development and community outreach. 

— In 2009 Steve Ziegler became the first player since Brandt Jobe in 1985 to sweep the CGA Match Play and Stroke Play titles in the same year.

— Coloradans John Elway and Tom Hart won the 2009 Trans-Miss Four-Ball title at Cherry Hills Country Club.

— Denver Country Club hosted the 2010 Trans-Miss Championship, won by Scott Pinckney, and the senior Trans Miss, won by Chip Lutz.

— After decades as a U.S. Open Sectional Qualifying site, Columbine Country Club lost that status after 2010.

— Wyndham Clark won the 2010 CGA Stroke Play at age 16, becoming the youngest winner of the event since Bob Byman in 1971. In the final round of the championship, Jim Knous shot a course-record 10-under-par 60 at Boulder Country Club to force a playoff, but Clark prevailed for the title.

— From 2010-13, Keith Humerickhouse claimed four consecutive CGA Mid-Amateur titles, becoming just the third person to win four straight CGA championships.

— In 2011, the Allied Golf Associations of Colorado became partners in the Colorado PGA Golf in Schools initiative, designed to introduce kids to golf through P.E. classes at school. The program has now reached more than 40,000 students.

— Green Gables Country Club, a storied course that dated back to the 1920s, closed in 2011. The course hosted six LPGA Tour events and one from the Senior PGA Tour.

— The CGA hosted the Junior America’s Cup at Hiwan Golf Club in 2011, when the Colorado team finished third, its best showing ever at the event (since matched in 2015).

— The CGA launched the Solich Caddie & Leadership Academy at CommonGround Golf Course in 2012. The Academy, named for University of Colorado Evans Scholar alums George and Geoff Solich, provides incentives to take caddies as it pays the base fee for the caddies, with the players having the option to tip. The caddies attend weekly leadership classes and do volunteer community-service work each summer. In Colorado, the Academy concept has spread to Fort Collins Country Club and Meridian Golf Club.

— Part-time Lakewood resident Hollis Stacy, winner of three U.S. Women’s Opens and six USGA championships in all, was inducted into World Golf Hall of Fame in 2012.

— The philanthropic Colorado Golf Foundation was launched in 2012, with CU Evans Scholar alum George Solich providing a $2 million lead gift. The foundation provides funding for Colorado-based organizations and programs that use golf to build important life skills and character, with an emphasis on instilling hard work and self-reliance in young people.

— In 2012, Coloradan Christie Austin, while serving on the USGA Executive Committee, became the first woman to chair the USGA Rules of Golf Committee.

— Coloradan Derek Tolan, who competed in the U.S. Open as a 16-year-old in 2002, won the HealthOne Colorado Open twice in a four-year period starting in 2009.

— In September 2013, about 14 inches of rain in less than a week caused devastating flooding (left), leading to major damage at many Colorado golf courses, including CommonGround GC and Coal Creek GC.

— Colorado resident Mark Wiebe won the Senior British Open in 2013, marking the first major championship of his career.

— Melissa Martin of Grand Junction became the seventh player to win the CWGA Stroke Play at least three times, doing so in the course of five years (2009-13).

— In 2014, the Colorado Open was played for the 50th time.

— Also in 2014, Kent Moore completed a sweep of major CGA championships — and has won at least one in five different decades. His resume includes victories in the Junior Match Play (1973), Stroke Play (1986), Match Play (1989), Mid-Amateur (1995), Senior Match (2006) and Senior Stroke (2014).

— In December 2014, the Evans Scholarship for caddies surpassed the 10,000 mark in graduates, including 434 from CU.

— Paige Spiranac won the 100th CWGA Match Play Championship in 2015 in a stellar final in which she was 9 under par for 35 holes against University of Colorado golfer Brittany Fan. And Jennifer Kupcho put on an exhibition at the CWGA Stroke Play, winning by an amazing 21 shots in posting a 16-under-par total.

— For the eighth time in a nine-year period (2007-15), members of the Colorado PGA, or the Section itself, won a national PGA of America Award. The honorees during that stretch were Danny Harvanek and Ann Finke (Junior Golf Leaders); George Kahrhoff, Dale Smigelsky and Jim Hajek (Merchandisers of the Year); Clayton Cole (Bill Strausbaugh Award), Kyle Heyen (President’s Plaque Award), and the Colorado PGA Section as a whole (Herb Graffis Award).

— Doug Rohrbaugh won three straight Colorado PGA Professional Championships from 2013-15, tying a record previously established, then matched, by Ron Vlosich and Ken Krieger, respectively. Rohrbaugh also captured the 2013 HealthOne Colorado Senior Open title.

— The CGA and Colorado PGA announced they’re joining forces to bolster junior golf in the state. A Junior Tour, which will include four junior major championships, is scheduled to debut in 2016. 

— The CGA is celebrating its 100th anniversary in 2015, culminating with a Century of Golf Gala in mid-November at The Broadmoor. Jack Nicklaus, who won his first and last USGA championships in Colorado (the 1959 U.S. Amateur and the 1993 U.S. Senior Open), is a guest of honor. Also among those who will be recognized are six People of the Century: Judy Bell (Woman of the Century), Hale Irwin (Male Player of the Century), Charles “Vic” Kline (Golf Professional of the Century), Dennis Lyon (Superintendent of the Century, Barbara McIntire (Female Player of the Century) and Will Nicholson Jr. (Man of the Century).

Editor’s Note: With the CGA celebrating the 100th anniversary of its founding in 1915, this is the ninth monthly installment of a series of stories looking back on the last century of golf in Colorado. All the articles are being published on coloradogolf.org. This chapter focuses on the period from 1995-2004. For the previous installments, CLICK HERE.

There have been many groundbreaking and pivotal moments for women in the history of golf in Colorado and beyond, but it hasn’t gotten much bigger in the Centennial State than in the mid- and late-1990s.

It started with The Broadmoor Golf Club in Colorado Springs hosting the 50th U.S. Women’s Open in 1995, marking the first time arguably the top championship in women’s golf has come to Colorado — or the Mountain time zone, for that matter. And though no one realized it at the time, one of the sport’s all-time greats was to emerge, as Annika Sorenstam made that tournament the first of what would become 72 LPGA Tour victories before she unexpectedly retired in 2008.

In the first of her 10 major championship wins, Sorenstam (below) finished a stroke ahead of Meg Mallon and two in front of Pat Bradley and Betsy King at The Broadmoor’s historic East Course. That was the first year the U.S. Women’s Open featured a purse of at least $1 million.

While all that was huge from a historical perspective, the next year was even more unique.

That was when Colorado Springs resident Judy Bell was elected president of the USGA, becoming the first female to hold that post. In fact, Bell’s two-year term beginning in January 1996 remains the only one in which a woman has served as USGA president since Theodore Havemeyer became the first president of the association in 1894.

“I bet that’s the first time the incoming president kissed the outgoing president on the way to the dais,” Bell memorably joked after it was announced she would succeed Reg Murphy.

But, as former USGA president Stuart Bloch noted, “Judy’s gender, I don’t believe, was a consideration in her election. Her abilities, I think, were the consideration that caused her to be selected as the first woman president. If she were a man, she would have been elected.”

Overall, Bell was the third Coloradan to become USGA president, following Denver residents Frank Woodward (1915-16) and Will Nicholson Jr. (1980-81). (Bell is pictured at top in a USGA photo presenting the low-amateur award to Cristie Kerr at the 1996 U.S. Women’s Open.)

During Bell’s presidency, the USGA started the “For the Good of the Game” program, a $50 million initiative which aimed to increasingly spread the game to groups such as youth, minorities and the disabled.

Bell had had a long, distinguished career as both a player and a volunteer golf administrator leading up to her presidency. She had served on the USGA Women’s Committee starting in 1968 and chaired that committee from 1981 to ’84. Then in 1987, she became the first woman elected to the USGA Executive Committee.

On the playing end, Bell won three Kansas women’s amateurs, starting at age 15, and three Broadmoor Ladies Invitation titles, competed in 38 USGA championships and was both a player and captain on U.S. Curtis Cup teams. And in 1964, she shot the lowest round in the history of the U.S. Women’s Open, a 6-under-par 67, a standard which stood for 14 years.

For all this and much more, Bell was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2001.

But Bell wasn’t the only woman from Colorado in USGA volunteer leadership roles around this time. Colorado Springs’ Barbara McIntire, winner of two U.S. Women’s Amateurs and a British Ladies Amateur, served as USGA Women’s Committee chair in 1995-96, and Denver’s Joan Birkland, another accomplished athlete, followed McIntire in that role in 1997-98.

On a more local level, 1995 marked the debut of the Colorado Women’s Open.

Here are some of the other Colorado golf highlights of the period from 1995-2004:

— Steve Jones (left), who grew up in Yuma, Colo., and played golf at the University of Colorado, won the 1996 U.S. Open, overcoming runners-up Davis Love and Tom Lehman. The victory culminated a remarkable comeback after Jones was off the PGA Tour for almost three years following a dirt-bike accident in November 1991. The victory gave former CU golfers four U.S. Open titles — three for Hale Irwin and one for Jones.

— In 1996, the CGA entered into an agreement with the Lowry Redevelopment Authority to purchase the former Lowry Air Force Base golf course. The CWGA became partner with the CGA in the purchase of the course. The site is now home of CommonGround Golf Course, which is owned and operated by the CGA and CWGA.

— From 1996 to ’98, Ken Krieger won three consecutive Colorado PGA Professional Championships, becoming the second player in the 1990s to do so, joining Ron Vlosich (1991-93).

— In the five-year period from 1997-2001, an amazing 42 courses opened in Colorado.

— Cherry Hills Country Club hosted the 1998 Trans Miss, won by Dan Dunkelberg. Coloradan John Olive was the runner-up.

— CU graduate Hale Irwin won two U.S. Senior Opens in three years, in 1998 and 2000. That gave the former Buff a total of five USGA championships, including his three U.S. Opens.

— In 1998, The Broadmoor hosted the biennial PGA Cup matches, which pits the top club professionals from the U.S. and Great Britain & Ireland. In Colorado Springs, the U.S. defeated GB&I 17-9.

— In the period from 1999 to 2002, Kevin Stadler won the CGA Match Play title twice, along with the 2002 Colorado Open championship in his pro debut. During the decade 1995-2004, Stadler and Jonathan Kaye (1996) won the Colorado Open en route to becoming PGA Tour champions.

— John Olive, winner of the 1977 CGA Match Play, became one of the top senior players in Colorado history. In addition to claiming titles in five CGA Senior Stroke Plays and four Senior Match Plays during this decade, he won the inaugural Colorado Senior Open (1999) and remains the only amateur to earn the title in that event.

— Colorado PGA members received four more PGA of America national awards in this decade: Alan Abrams (1997 Junior Golf Leader), Mike McGetrick (1999 Teacher of the Year), Charles “Vic” Kline (2000 Golf Professional of the Year) and Russ Miller (2003 Resort Merchandiser of the Year).

— In 2000, Coloradan Kaye Kessler won the PGA of America’s National Lifetime Achievement Award for Journalism.

— Also in 2000, Warren Simmons retired as CGA executive director, with Ed Mate succeeding him. Mate continues in the position to this day.

— Nicki Cutler won the CWGA Stroke Play three times in a four-year period from 2000-03.

— Rick DeWitt, the 1999 CGA Stroke Play champ, won the last of his record seven CGA Mid-Amateur titles in 2002 before being inducted into the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame and later turning pro. He was named CGA Player of the Year a record six times.

— With financial issues and mismanagement burdening the Colorado Open, the 2003 championship was called off during tournament week. Thanks in large part to developer Pat Hamill, the event was resurrected in 2004.

— The International at Castle Pines saw two future World Golf Hall of Famers — Phil Mickelson (1993 and ’97) and Davis Love III (1990 and 2003) win the PGA Tour event for the second time.

— Les Fowler, a Colorado Golf Hall of Fame player and a former CGA president who had a key role in the CGA acquiring the golf course at Lowry, passed away in 2003.

— In 2004, Steve Irwin, a former pro who regained his amateur status, joined his father Hale (1966) as a winner of the CGA Match Play.

— Jamie Lovemark won the prestigious 2004 Western Junior at Denver Country Club. Lovemark later became the No. 1-ranked amateur in the world.
 

Editor’s Note: With the CGA celebrating the 100th anniversary of its founding in 1915, this is the sixth monthly installment of a series of stories looking back on the last century of golf in Colorado. All the articles are being published on coloradogolf.org. This chapter focuses on the period from 1965-74. For the previous installments, CLICK HERE.

The decade beginning in 1965 featured some new twists on major championship themes in Colorado golf.

For the first time, a Colorado venue other than Cherry Hills Country Club hosted a men’s major. And golfers who grew up in Boulder won not one but two USGA championships, including a U.S. Open, plus an NCAA title.

The PGA Championship was scheduled to be played at Columbine Country Club south of Denver in 1966, but the June 1965 flood of the South Platte River — which runs adjacent to parts of the course — caused a change of plans.

Firestone Country Club in Ohio was set to host the 1967 PGA, but with the flood damage at Columbine, the USGA swapped the years for the two venues, giving Columbine the 1967 slot.

Unlike PGAs in recent decades, the ’67 championship was played in late July. In fact, it took place the week after another major, the British Open, was contested in Liverpool, England.

The ’67 PGA was, at the time, the longest course in major championship history at 7,436 yards, though with the mile-high elevation it played significantly shorter. That year also marked the second and final 18-hole Monday playoff in PGA Championship history, with Don January (below) prevailing over Dan Massengale for his lone victory in a major. The playoff format was later changed to sudden-death, then to a three-hole aggregate. Jack Nicklaus finished a shot out of the playoff, in third place.

A couple months earlier that same year, University of Colorado athlete Hale Irwin (pictured at top) started making an indelible imprint nationally as a competitive golfer. In the spring of 1967, Irwin captured college golf’s top honor by winning the NCAA Championship at Shawnee on Delaware, Pa. That same year, Irwin also prevailed at the prestigious Broadmoor Invitation.

Seven years later, after claiming his first two PGA Tour victories in the interim, Irwin would really make some noice in the tournament that would largely define his career, the U.S. Open. In a championship that became known as the “Massacre at Winged Foot,” Irwin claimed the title with a 7-over-par 287 total, giving him the first of three U.S. Open victories.

Coincidentally, another golfer who grew up in Boulder also claimed a USGA title during the first half of the 1970s. Bob Byman, who would join Irwin as a three-time winner of the CGA Stroke Play (1971-73), won the 1972 U.S. Junior Amateur as a 17-year-old, defeating Scott Simpson in the final match. That year, Byman also qualified for the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach, where he was the youngest player in the field. Byman said he won all but two or three of the roughly 15 tournaments in which he played in 1972. The next year, he won the Colorado state high school title. In 1971, Byman had become the youngest winner of the CGA Stroke Play, capturing the championship at age 16.

On the women’s side of things, 1972 was a momentous time as that’s when Colorado began a run of 16 consecutive years of hosting LPGA Tour events. The first of those events, the National Jewish Hospital Open, was held at Green Gables Country Club. Other Colorado venues were Rolling Hills, Pinehurst, Columbine, Lone Tree, Meridian and Glenmoor.

Out of the 16 tournaments held in Colorado, an amazing 12 champions are now members of the World Golf Hall of Fame: Sandra Haynie (1972 and ’74), Judy Rankin (1975), Joanne Carner (1977 and ’81), Kathy Whitworth (1978), Beth Daniel (1980 and ’82), Pat Bradley (1983 and ’85), Betsy King (1984) and Amy Alcott (1986).

Here are some of the other Colorado golf highlights of the decade from 1965-74:

— Every player who won the CGA Stroke Play championship in this 10-year period is now a member of the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame: Irwin (1965), Bill Carey (1966), Ron Moore (1967), Les Fowler (1968), John Hamer (1969 and ’70), Bob Byman (1971 through ’73) and Gary Longfellow (1974).

— In 1965, Colorado hosted two USGA championships, the U.S. Women’s Amateur at Lakewood Country Club (won by Jean Ashley) and the U.S. Girls’ Junior at Hiwan Golf Club (won by Gail Sykes).

— Bob Dickson took a liking to the Broadmoor in the mid-1960s as he won the Broadmoor Invitation in 1966 before returning to the club the following year to capture the U.S. Amateur title. Dickson would go on to win twice on the PGA Tour. Another future PGA Tour champiuon, Grier Jones, earned the Broadmoor Invitation title in 1968.

— In 1968, Jim Haines of Denver Country Club won the national USGA Green Section Award, given to individuals who contribute significantly to golf through their work with turfgrass.

— Evergreen resident Dave Hill captured the Vardon Trophy in 1969, with a season-long scoring average of 70.34 on the PGA Tour. That same year, Hill and fellow Coloradan Dale Douglass played on the U.S. Ryder Cup team.

— In 1969, for the fifth time in 17 years, the Broadmoor hosted the men’s NCAA Division I golf championships.

— Carol (Sorenson) Flenniken, who won the 1960 U.S. Girls’ Junior, the 1962 Women’s Western Amateur and the 1964 British Ladies Amateur, claims the first of her dozen CWGA Match Plays/Stroke Plays in 1968. She captured eight Stroke Play titles and four Match Plays.

— The CGA took on a bigger role, establishing a Course Rating and Measuring Committee in 1969 and offering handicap computation services starting in 1970.

— From 1971 through ’74, a remarkable total of 33 new courses opened up in Colorado.

— The first Colorado Cup matches, between the best amateurs and professionals in Colorado, was played in 1971, with the pros winning at Lakewood Country Club.

— The Colorado Golf Hall of Fame was founded in 1973, with Babe Zaharias, Babe Lind and Dave Hill the first class of inductees.

— The CGA and Colorado PGA hired a joint executive director in 1971, naming Jerry King to the post.

— Cherry Creek High school golfer Mike Reid won the 1971 CGA Junior Match Play. Reid would go on to win twice on the PGA Tour and two majors on the Champions Tour.

— Larry McAtee won his fourth CGA Match Play title in 1972, defeating Mark Achzinger in a 38-hole final.

— Future PGA Tour player Tom Purtzer won the Broadmoor Invitation in 1973.

— Warren Smith, the head professional at Cherry Hills Country Club, received a prestigious national honor in 1973, being named the Golf Professional of the Year by the PGA of America.

— In 1974, Coloradan Gary Longfellow became the first amateur to win the Colorado Open and the only person ever to pull off the triple crown by winning the Open and the CGA Stroke Play and Match Play in the same year.
 

Editor’s Note: With the CGA celebrating the 100th anniversary of its founding in 1915, this is the third monthly installment of a series of stories looking back on the last century of golf in Colorado. All the articles are being published on coloradogolf.org. This chapter focuses on the period from 1935-44. For a list of all the installments to date, CLICK HERE.

The decade from 1935 to ’44 was certainly a tumultuous time in the country, with the Great Depression lasting through the ’30s and then World War II posing one of the biggest challenges the U.S. has ever faced.

Ironically, it was during this same period that Colorado golf burst onto the national scene.

Twice in a remarkably short timespan of less than three years, Cherry Hills Country Club hosted major championships — the first two of what is now a half-dozen men’s majors that have come to the state. Five of those six have been held at Cherry Hills.

The club was the site of the 1938 U.S. Open — the first Open staged west of Minneapolis — and the 1941 PGA Championship, the first PGA held in the Mountain Time Zone.

Will Nicholson Sr. (left), a future Denver mayor, was a member of the USGA Executive Committee from 1937-41. He served as general chairman of the ’38 Open after playing an integral role, with prominent local insurance man Clarence Daly, in bringing the tournament to Colorado.

With the Great Depression still plaguing the country, and with the U.S. Open never having ventured west of Minneapolis, the USGA was concerned about ticket sales and therefore required Cherry Hills to raise money for a $10,000 bond to assure profitability. Nicholson and Daly took the lead in that effort so the championship could go on.

“It was the first time that (major) championship golf had ever come to Colorado, and it wouldn’t have come to Colorado if it wasn’t for one person, and that person is Will Nicholson Sr.,” current Cherry Hills head professional John Ogden noted in a 2013 speech. “He had the vision and the determination to bring championship golf not just to Cherry Hills but to Colorado. Since then, we know what has happened. Cherry Hills has had numerous championships, the Broadmoor, Columbine (and) The International kind of sprung from that. Without the vision of Mr. Nicholson, none of this would be possible.”

At the ’38 Open, Ralph Guldahl (pictured at top) rallied with a final-round 69 and won by six strokes — the largest margin at the U.S. Open since 1921 — in successfully defending his national title. He holds the distinction of being the last U.S. Open champ to win while wearing a necktie. Ironically, shortly after prevailing at the U.S. Open, Guldahl lost by three strokes at his home course in the New Jersey State Open.

The 1938 U.S. Open also will be remembered for the tournament’s single-hole-record 19 that competitor Ray Ainsley recorded on the par-4 16th hole, where he kept whacking at his ball in the creek near the green.

Guldahl was one of the top golfers in the world in the late ’40s, supplementing his two U.S. Open victories with a Masters title and three straight wins in the Western Open, which then was considered a major championship of sorts.

Overall, the ’38 Open proved a big success, drawing about 37,000 spectators for the week to Cherry Hills.

Three years later, another of the current Grand Slam events visited Cherry Hills. Through 1957, the PGA Championship was a match-play event, and the ’41 version was the last time the 36-hole final went extra holes.

At Cherry Hills, defending champion Byron Nelson defeated Guldahl, Ben Hogan and Gene Sarazen to reach the final, but Vic Ghezzi foiled Nelson’s run to the title by outlasting him in 38 holes. Nelson missed a 30-inch putt on the second green. It would be the only major championship for Ghezzi, who rallied after being 3 down after 27 holes in the final match.

Here are some of the other Colorado golf highlights from the period 1935-44:

— In 1936, the Rocky Mountain Golf Course Superintendents Association was founded, with the goal of improving golf course management practices through education, sharing knowledge and networking.

— Starting in 1937, the Denver District Golf Association conducted a stroke-play championship. For more than two decades, what are now known as the CGA Match Play and Stroke Play championships were conducted by separate organizations. Nate Grimes won the first Stroke Play title in 1937. Babe Lind captured two of his three Stroke Plays during World War II (1941 and ’42), sparking a career that would culminate with his being inducted in the inaugural class of the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame in 1973. In 1943, Claude Wright won the first of his four Stroke Plays. He also claimed two Match Play titles (1944 and ’56).

— In 1939, the first Rocky Mountain Open is played in Grand Junction. The event has been held each year since, making it the oldest continuously-conducted golf championship in Colorado that is open to both professionals and amateurs.

— In 1942, a group of African-American golfers based at City Park Golf Course formed the East Denver Golf Club. East Denver GC, which wasn’t allowed membership in the CGA until the early 1960s, became a member of the Central States Golf Association, a group of golf clubs with primarily African-American members.

— Several of the nation’s top amateur championships were held in Colorado in the decade beginning in 1935. The Western Amateur was hosted by the Broadmoor in 1935 and ’41, the latter being one of three Western Ams won by Bud Ward in the 1940s. The Broadmoor was also the site of the 1939 Trans Miss — won by Chick Harbert, who would go on to earn seven titles on the PGA Tour — while Cherry Hills hosted the ’37 Trans Miss. And the Women’s Trans National came to Denver Country Club in 1936.

In addition, Sam Snead played an exhibition at Boulder Golf Club (now the site of Flatirons Golf Course) in the late 1930s. A photo with a scoreboard from that day notes that Snead went 9 under par.

Next up: 1945-54, when legends Babe Zaharias and Ben Hogan made their mark in Colorado golf.
 

Editor’s Note: With the CGA celebrating the 100th anniversary of its founding in 1915, this is the second monthly installment of a series of stories looking back on the last century of golf in Colorado. All the articles will be published on ColoradoGolf.org. This chapter focuses on the period from 1925-34. For a list of all installments to date, CLICK HERE. 

The decade beginning in 1925 featured some of the highest highs and lowest lows in Colorado golf history — just as it did for the nation as a whole.

The most obvious reason was the dawning of the Great Depression. The country went from the Roaring Twenties to one of the worst economic collapses the U.S. has ever seen, starting with the stock market crash in October 1929.

Colorado golf, of course, reflected what was happening nationwide. In the last half of the 1920s, such local gems as Wellshire Golf Course (1926) and Green Gables Country Club (1928) — both of which would go on to host men’s or women’s tour events — opened for business. But in the quarter-century from 1930 through ’54, a grand total of just eight new courses that still exist came online.

There’s no other 25-year period in Colorado golf in which so few courses opened.

But those certainly aren’t the only highs and lows of this time. The decade from 1925-34 witnessed the beginning and end of two of the most successful runs in Colorado amateur golf history.

In 1928, dentist Larry Bromfield (left) defeated Nate Grimes 1-up in the CGA Match Play final, marking his eighth and final victory in the event, a feat unmatched to this day. How good was Bromfield? In 1922, he played the famous Gene Sarazen in a 36-hole exhibition, taking him to the final hole before losing 2-down.

And on the women’s side, in 1930 Phyllis Buchanan won the first of her record six CWGA Match Play titles. The Denver resident also captured the prestigious Women’s Trans National championship in 1933 in Iowa.

Then there was an out-of-stater who did great things in Colorado in 1933 en route to a World Golf Hall of Fame career. Read on for more about him.

Here are some of the other Colorado golf highlights from the period 1925-34:

— From 1927 through ’33, the Broadmoor Golf Club in Colorado Springs hosted the prestigious Trans-Miss championship a remarkable three times in seven years. The winners of the titles those years were John Goodman (1927), Robert McCrary (1930) and Gus Moreland (1933). Goodman went on to claim the championship three times and Moreland and McCrary twice each.

— In 1933 rapidly emerging Stanford golfer Lawson Little (pictured at top) had a big year in Colorado. He won the title in the Broadmoor Invitation in Colorado Springs, one of the top amateur tournaments of the time, and captured the CGA Match Play championship with a 9 and 7 victory over Frank English in the final. Little also finished runner-up to Moreland at the Broadmoor in the Trans-Miss. He would go on to be inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame after sweeping the U.S. and British Amateur titles in both 1934 and ’35. During his run in the two national amateur events, Little won a remarkable 32 consecutive matches. He went on to capture the U.S. Open in 1940. Lawson and Hale Irwin (1967) have the distinction of being the only Broadmoor Invitation winners who were inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame.

Joining Little in capturing the Broadmoor Invitation title during the decade we’re detailing was N.C. “Tub” Morris (1928), for whom the CGA Stroke Play Championship Trophy is named.

— Will Nicholson Sr. (left, at the Broadmoor Invitation), who would become the mayor of Denver in 1955, played a key role at the Western Golf Association in the mid-1930s, serving as a director from 1933 to ’36 before becoming a member of the USGA Executive Committee. Nicholson’s son, Will Jr., became president of the USGA in 1980.

— In 1929, Denver Country Club hosted the Women’s Trans National Championship, and Mrs. O.S. Hill of Kansas City, Mo., won the second of her four Trans National titles.

Next up: 1935-44, when Colorado hosts its first major championships.