The great, feisty Louise Suggs began her march toward winning the St. Louis Golf Open on this date in 1955. Three days later she had shot a four-under 289 to beat Mary Lena Faulk by six shots and win first prize of $900. She died in 2015 at age 91.
On this date in 1968, in Eugene, Oregon, Sandra Haynie, 25, bogeyed two of her last three holes but still won the $12,500 Pacific Ladies' Classic by three strokes. The Fort Worth, Texas, golfer won $1,875. She finished 54 holes at 213, three-under-par on the 6,361-yard, par-72 Eugene Country Club. She hadn't won since the September 1967 Mickey Wright Invitational in Bonsall, Calif. Sandra Palmer and Kathy Cornelius tied for second.
Steve Jones, who had a brief but successful time on the PGA Tour that included winning the 1996 U.S. Open, won the Canadian Open on this date in 1997 with a score of 275.
The 19th playing of the U.S. Amateur golf championship finished on this day in 1913 and was won by Jerry Travers. He won for the second year in a row and defeated John Anderson, 5 & 4.
The 1982 U.S. Men's Amateur Golf Championship was won by Jay Sigel on this date at The Country Club when he handily won, 8 & 7, over David Tolley. This ties in with the Day in Golf note for yesterday September 4.
Jay Sigel won the 1983 U.S. Amateur Golf Championship on this date at North Shore Country Club, by an 8 & 7 score over Chris Perry, to give him two consecutive victories. He had also won 8 & 7 the previous year over David Tolley at The Country Club.
Billy Casper, the odd-man out of the Big Three of Palmer, Nicklaus and Player, won his 50th PGA Tour victory on this date in 1973 at age 42. He finished at 20-under-par 264 to beat Australian Bruce Devlin by one stroke to win the Sammy Davis Jr. Greater Hartford Open. When he finished on the 18th green, a group of people 30,000 strong surrounded it as he celebrated his fourth victory in the tournament.
The 1940 PGA Championship ended on this date. It was the 23rd PGA, held at Hershey Country Club in Hershey, Pennsylvania. It was a meeting of titans: Byron Nelson won his first PGA, defeating Sam Snead, 1-up, in the 36-hole final.
The 1893 Open Championship ended on this date. The tournament was played over two days, 36 each day. The winner at Prestwick, in Scotland, was Scotsman Willie Auchterlonie, who shot 322, two shots ahead of Johnny Laidlay.
Fifty years ago on this date, Bruce Fleisher won the U.S. Amateur at Scioto Country Club in Columbus, Ohio, with Vinny Giles the runner-up for a second straight year. The Associated Press story read: Young Bruce Fleisher withstood the furious late charge of Marvin (Vinny) Giles III Saturday and rode an even-par 70 to a one-stroke victory in the 68th U.S. Amateur Golf Championship. The 19-year-old from Hialeah, Fla., nailed down the big prize in his first national tournament, finishing with a 72-hole total of 284, four over par for the distance. Giles, the 25-year-old University of Virginia law student from Charlottesville, made a gallant bid to overtake the leader with a sizzling five-under-par 65, a course record on the tough 6,760-yard Scioto layout.
Two U.S. Amateur championships ended on this date, August 30. Steve Melnyk won in 1969 at Oakmont, shooting a 70 in the final round during a year the event was stroke play. Billy Mayfair in 1987 won by defeating Eric Rebmann, 4&3, at Jupiter Hills.
Brandie Burton won the du Maurier Classic on this date in 1993 when she defeated Betsy King in a playoff. The two were tied at 11-under 277 at the London Hunt & Country Club in London, Ontario, after regulation. First prize was $120,000.
Having won three straight U.S. Junior titles, Tiger Woods, on this date in 1994, won the first of three straight U.S. Amateur championships. At Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., he defeated Trip Kuehne, 2 up, winning the final three holes on the Stadium Course after once trailing 6 down during the 36-hole match. At the time, the victory made Woods the youngest, at 18, to win the Amateur. He became the first golfer to win both the U.S. Junior and U.S. Amateur in a career.
On this date in 1995, the Canadian du Maurier Classic was won by Jenny Lidback at Beaconsfield Golf Club in Pointe-Claire, Quebec, with an eight-under-par total of 280. She won by one over Liselotte Neumann of Sweden. Brooke Henderson was another Canadian who won her native country's CP Women's Open, by four shots in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada,, in 2018.
Marlene Hagge shot 284 at Lakewood Country Club to win the Denver Open on this date of the fourth round in 1956. She took home $800 for first; Fay Crocker was second , six shots behind.
This is the latest the PGA Championship finished in the month of August. The 1946 playing ended on this date with Ben Hogan winning the title, 6&4, over Ed (Porky) Oliver. This was Hogan's first of two PGAs he won. The championship was held at Portland (Ore.) Golf Club. This PGA was also notable for it being the last time Byron Nelson played in the major. He lost to Oliver in the quarterfinals and overall had a 37-8 record.
Texas A&M senior Sam Bennett won the U.S. Amateur this past Sunday at Pebble Beach. On this date in 1997, Matt Kuchar won the U.S. Amateur, defeating Joel Kribel, 2 & 1, in the 36-hole final at Cog Hill's Dubsdread course in Lemont, III. Kuchar, 19 at the time, was from Lake Mary, Fla., and a golf team member at Georgia Tech. He was playing in the U.S. Amateur for the first time.
Beth Daniel won the World Championship of Women's Golf on this date in 1981, at Shaker Heights (Ohio) Country Club. She went home with the $50,000 first-place prize money.
Two influential names in women’s golf history shared the stage on this date in 1976. Kathy Whitworth won the Patty Berg Classic at Keller Golf Course in St. Paul, Minnesota. Whitworth shot a seven-under-par score of 212 to win by two shots over Sandra Post. First prize was $8,000.
The third PGA Championship ended on this date in 1920. Jock Hutchison--who golf writers forever have to fight copy editors that they don't change his name to Hutchinson--defeated Douglas Edgar, 1-up, at Flossmoor Country Club in Chicago in the 36-hole final.