Lee Trevino

When Lee Trevino arrived at the US Open at Oak Hill in 1968 he was just another face in the crowd. Jack Nicklaus or Arnold Palmer were expected to take the title, not a man who was self-taught and since leaving the Marines eight years earlier had been scratching out a living giving lessons, working at a driving range and playing money matches. The previous week, his hopes of claiming a first title had evaporated when he bogeyed the last two holes to lose by one to Roberto De Vicenzo in Houston. This late capitulation had dealt a serious blow to his confidence and rather than going home to lick his wounds with his wife and young son, the 28-year-old journeyman chose to wallow alone in his own misery.

“I didn’t want to be around my family and I didn’t want to be around my friends,” he recalled years later. “I could have gone home, but I drove to Connecticut to hit a few balls and practice. As I drove up I noticed the lights on for a Little League baseball game. I had a bucket of fried chicken and six beers and I just sat in my car and watched. I had never won a golf tournament before, so to bogey 17 and 18, yeah, it bothered me. It bothered me bad. I was crying into my glass of beer.”

History tells us that Trevino went on to win that US Open title, becoming the first man to shoot four consecutive sub-70 rounds in the process. Golf’s latest superstar had announced himself to the world in the most stunning fashion imaginable. He would go on to become the Everyman’s champion, the poor kid made good, the joker who threw a rubber snake at Jack Nicklaus

» Lee Trevino Pt.2