Walter Travis
| Walter Travis | |
|---|---|
Travis in 1909
|
|
| Personal information | |
| Full name | Walter J. Travis |
| Nickname | The Old Man |
| Born |
January 10, 1862 Maldon, Victoria, Australia |
| Died | July 31, 1927 (aged 65) Denver, Colorado, U.S. |
| Nationality |
 Australia United States
|
| Spouse | Anne Bent |
| Career | |
| Status | Amateur |
| Best results in major championships (wins: 4) |
|
| U.S. Open | T2: 1902 |
| The Open Championship | CUT: 1904 |
| PGA Championship | DNP |
| U.S. Amateur | Won: 1900, 1901, 1903 |
| British Amateur | Won: 1904 |
| Achievements and awards | |
| World Golf Hall of Fame | 1979 (member page) |
Walter J. Travis (January 10, 1862 – July 31, 1927) was an American amateur golfer in the during the early 1900s. He was also a noted golf journalist and publisher, an innovator in all aspects of golf, a teacher, and golf course architect.
Travis was born in Maldon, Australia. He arrived in New York City in 1886 as a 23-year-old representative of the Australian-based McLean Brothers and Rigg exporters of hardware and construction products. Travis married Anne Bent of Middleton, Connecticut, on January 9, 1890, and later that year, he became a naturalized citizen of the United States. Shortly after their wedding, Travis and his wife moved into their new home in Flushing, New York, where they would live until their move to Garden City, on Long Island, in 1900.
In 1896, while traveling in England, Travis learned that his Niantic Club friends of Flushing, New York, were intent on creating a new golf club. He was scornful of the idea but, wishing to keep up with his friends, he purchased a set of golf clubs to take with him on his return to the United States. As he said, "I first knelt at the shrine of the Goddess of Golf" in October 1896 on the Oakland links, just three months before his 35th birthday. Within a month of hitting his first golf shot, Travis earned his first trophy by winning the Oakland Golf Club handicap competition. Travis became, in his words, "an infatuated devotee" of the game. He dedicated himself to the study of instructional books written by Horace Hutchinson, Willie Park, Jr., and others. He practiced relentlessly. Within a year, Travis won the Oakland Golf Club championship with a score of 82.
In 1898, Travis entered his first U.S. Amateur and lost to Findlay S. Douglas in the semi-final match. By this time, he had caught the attention and respect of fellow competitors and, because of his late start in the game, Travis was respectfully referred to as "The Old Man" or "The Grand Old Man". Driven by his intense and compulsive dedication to the game, Travis was soon the country's top amateur golfer, winning the U.S. Amateur in 1900, 1901, and 1903. In 1904, he became the first player from America to win the British Amateur, a feat that would not be duplicated for another 22 years even with "wholesale assaults and single attempts to duplicate" his feat by great amateur golfers such as Jerome Travers, Francis Ouimet, and Bobby Jones. The news of Travis's British victory sparked a surge of interest in the game of golf throughout the United States.
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Wikipedia