GOLF BOOK CLUB: Fairways GreensBy Dan Jenkins

TOO OFTEN, an anthology of newspaper or magazine columns make little sense when bound together; they age like a rotten egg rather than a fine wine. This book, though, is more like a rare claret. It is a timeless collection of stories from arguably the greatest living writer on golf, with humorous insights into the sport and some of the game’s greatest players.

Let me put my hands up here. I’m in awe of Dan Jenkins. I’m not a spotty teenager (God be with the days!) but, any time the man walks into a press centre at one of the major championships, there’s this sense of being present among greatness.

This collection not only conveys Jenkins’ humour, it also imparts his passion and gives a myriad of stories to which the elite player and the hacker and the simple observer can relate; more often than not with a smile on your face, and with the assurance that – if you’re reading in public — you’ll get some strange looks from strangers as you chortle to yourself at Jenkins’ recollections.

Of course, there is a lot of Ben Hogan in this book. Why wouldn’t there be? The pair were friends, and would regularly play 18 holes of golf at Colonial where Jenkins – who was a good collegiate player who rather than going on tour with a set of golf clubs did so with a typewriter – would always walk off the course marvelling at Hogan’s play but at least grateful that whenever his children asked him who he used to play golf with, he could always answer, “Oh . . . Ben Hogan.” Jenkins cut his teeth writing about Hogan for his local Texas newspaper and followed him for the rest of his career, but this anthology takes in many other superstars of the game and those who weren’t but could have been.

You’re left in no doubt of Jenkins’ attitude to the journeyman pro – or Bobby Joe Grooves, the fictional player he uses in a number of columns – who pockets fist loads of greenbacks without ever getting near to winning a tournament, or Jenkins’ fondness for a number of players including Tommy “Thunder” Bolt who won the 1958 US Open at Southern Hills in Tulsa.

Bolt had the reputation for having a terrible temper. On one occasion, he “pretended” to be angry at a Tulsa writer for saying in a report that he was 49 rather than 40 years of age. When the reporter made the excuse that it was a typographical error, Bolt retorted. “Typographical error, hell. It was a perfect four and a perfect nine.”

Of Bolt, Jenkins writes: “Perhaps Old Tom knew he was never destiny’s child, and maybe this is why, now and then, after blowing a short putt, he would look up at the sky, and say, ‘Why don’t You come on down here and play me one time?’.”

Jenkins was lucky. In those days, he could walk up the fairway with a golfer. Not only that, he could interact with the player. The players and golf writers actually talked as they walked up the fairways. For sure, they are bygone days, but Jenkins succeeds in giving us an insight into what it was like and, more importantly, what these great players were like.

But not all of the stories are about others; Jenkins was a fine golfer in his own right at collegiate level, the top of the amateur game in the United States, and is not averse to some self-deprecating humour. The best is probably the tale of how he faced a certain Morris Williams Jr in a conference final at Colonial, which included Hogan among the gallery (albeit watching from an electric buggy).

The story goes that Jenkins hit a career shot to six inches (for what would be a tap-in birdie if not a concession from his opponent) from an impossible lie in the rough up and over trees with three holes to go in their duel.

As Jenkins put it, “for the next long moment, while I waited for my opponent to spray his own approach out of shell shock, I entertained some wonderful thoughts. I had a gimme birdie, thus I was going to be one up on Morris Williams, Jr, with only two holes to play. I was going to beat Morris Williams, Jr. I was going to win the individual championship in the conference tournament next month. I was going to turn pro, go on tour, wear beltless slacks, and complain about courtesy car drivers the rest of my life. I was . . .” While he was dreaming, Morris holed out with his seven-iron for an eagle two, and that match effectively ended.

Williams had planned to turn professional but, before he had the chance, was killed in action on military service. As for Jenkins? He never made it out on tour as a player, figuring the realisation that such golf was beyond him came when he couldn’t swing the club around his stomach. Which was no bad thing. It meant he could write for a living.

Questions for readers

Jenkins makes a strong argument that Ben Hogan’s win in the “National Open” tournament in 1942 should count as a fifth US Open win. Do you agree?

In this pre-Tiger age, Jenkins has Hogan, Nicklaus and Jones as co-winners of his Dream World tournament. Does this assessment stand the test of time?

Jenkins claims that golf is a game of annoyances, giving examples such as the “man who won’t pick up his ball when he’s out of the hole” and the player with “individual iron covers”. Do you share his sentiments?

In his article on playing with President George Bush, Jenkins admits that all of the players involved took at least one “mulligan“. Should mulligans be allowed in social golf?

How do you rate this book out of a possible top mark of 10?