Sorry gang, but I need a break from the Hogan nine. Can we call this a rain delay, or maybe an extra hole? My mind is on something else right now.

The greatest golfer I’ve ever known has been ill and is struggling. He is not Ben Hogan, Jack Nicklaus or even Tiger Woods, nor is he one of the 200+ touring pros I’ve known and worked with over the years. He didn’t even play on a professional tour, but what a game he had. I’ve never seen anyone greater.

Like many of my stories, he is an old timer. He was born in 1929. Some folks call him Junior. He had six brothers and three sisters (most gone now), but Junior is the only golfer who came from his country family.

This is no excuse for breaking the law, but times were tough in the 30s. So Junior’s father and two of his uncles made moonshine in the Oklahoma Ozarks. They called it Three Brother’s Whiskey. They even had their own logo and labels for the bottles.

Junior’s mother had a special petticoat she wore under her long dress that had pockets for the pints of whiskey to sell. Deep in the hills, the brothers made whiskey during the week, and then would travel on the weekends with Junior’s mother to the streets of Fort Smith, Ark., to sell it. The cops wouldn’t frisk women in those days, so if Junior’s mother would stand still with the whiskey in the petticoat pockets, the inventory was safe until the boys had made a sale.

Junior’s mother would then deliver the goods from under her dress when the cops weren’t looking. When the petticoat was depleted, she would go back to the truck to restock. In the 40s and 50s, Junior’s father would become a lawman. This is all a true story, and I’m not kidding. The moonshiner turned deputy sheriff was very colorful and very popular.

Junior didn’t help in the moonshine business, but he did grow up plowing behind mules and doing tough farm work. During World War II, the family moved to Point Richmond, Calif. Junior’s older brother went off to war, but Junior was a few years too young to fight. So at the age of 14, he got a job alongside his older sisters, as well as thousands of women, old men and teenage boys building warships at the Kaiser Shipyards. Most all of the fighting age healthy men were off to war.

Junior became a first-class welder early in his teenage years, making warships during the day and attending high school at night. After the war, his family went back to the hills of Oklahoma, but another war was coming and Junior would be of prime age for that one.

When the Korean War heated up, Junior got his notice from the local draft board. That war would be his introduction to the wonderful game of golf.

As a new infantry solider, Junior boarded a train to California. The train was to take him to the troop ship convoy bound for Korea and the shooting war. A major rain delay (one different than we experience in golf) put the trains off schedule and canceled several connections. When he finally arrived and reported in California, he assumed the army would have another way for him to get over to the fight. While waiting there, a first sergeant learned he had been a shipyard welder and had him transferred to Panama to work salvage and underwater welding in the structures and ships of the Canal. They said it was easier to teach a welder to dive than to teach a diver to weld. So at 22 years old, Junior then was off to Panama, where he later told me he found mosquitoes and the Fort Davis golf course. Before this assignment to Panama, he had never been near a golf club or golf ball.

Life must have been boring at times there, so Junior checked out that golf thing. He was a great athlete — I heard he once scored seven touchdowns in one high school football game in ’47 — and he quickly learned and loved the game of golf. He played as much as possible while in Panama after a few soldiers took him to the course for the first time. He said he may have never found golf without the war, the Army and his special army golfing buddy for life, Jack. I’m so glad those two became friends, and I’m so glad Junior found golf… for so many reasons.

After Panama, Junior brought his new game and clubs back to Oklahoma and the family farm. The only real golf course in the county was a not-so-groomed 9-holer, but Junior didn’t mind. He stayed connected with his new game as he worked on the rest of his life. The G.I. Bill, college, a new family and his love of learning led him to become a math teacher and then later a high school principal. He taught and led more than 4,000 kids over the years.

After his school years, he won a seat in the state legislature and became a truly honest politician. There are not many of those. Junior’s life as a true servant made him the most revered and loved man in his county. Some even have called him “our George Bailey” after the beloved Jimmy Stewart character in Frank Capra’s Christmas movie, “It’s a Wonderful Life.” And all the while the rest of life was happening, Junior kept smacking his Spalding’s and playing the county’s little 9-hole course.

Most of Junior’s real golf was played on that country 9-holer, but for one or two weeks each year Junior played a very special place. When the time was just right, he would cut hay on a small section of his family ranch. After the bales were hauled off, the lush Bermuda grass meadow was perfect farm turf. Isn’t that how golf got started in Scotland… goats and sheep eating off the fairways along the seaside links?

Junior would set up his farm holes and tee boxes. Until the grass, the mama cows and their dung piles took over again, the hay meadow was his own private “country” club. Only very special people were invited to play there. That cow pasture is where I first saw Junior hit a golf shot. I lived very nearby, and one day he invited me to come out to the hay meadow and play. Junior was so long, and I was mesmerized when he hit the ball. How did he do that? Wow! I’ve got to do that just like him.

Junior helped me grip the club and gave me my first few lessons. A few weeks later, I joined him when he played the real 9-holer. He was very patient, and wanted me to know what he knew. He was my hero. I was young and absorbing everything. Later, when the cows came back into the meadow, I learned the meaning of a really bad lie.

Junior had an Arnold Palmer-style, herky-jerky finish, so I tried to do the same for years. Only after I saw Tom Purtzer and Fred Couples years later did I appreciate a smooth, fluid finish. Until then, I thought Junior’s violent “Palmer The King of the Army” form was the best. Maybe it still is, but my shoulder now likes something closer to Purtzer.

Back to Junior.

Because I grew up and lived so close to that pasture, I was blessed to learn the first part of my game there from him. That hay pasture was where I first saw a glimpse of the game. Life has never been the same since, because that’s when I fell in love with golf. That love and the many rounds that followed would lead me to seek a job with Mr. Hogan, which made Junior proud. Ben Hogan was an army veteran, too, and served during WWII. Junior had been an avid fan of Hogan, and vividly remembered the ‘53 slam. He was happy that one of his students was working for Bantam Ben.

Junior came to visit me several times in Fort Worth. He loved the factory and Ben Hogan’s Shady Oaks. I showed him Hogan’s locker, and the place I first met Mr. Hogan, too. Junior beamed.

These last few weeks have been tough for Junior. It is really hard to watch such a strong man struggle and grind so hard. I’ve never known a man or golfer who has changed more lives for the better than my hero, Junior.

The really old timers who called him Junior are mostly gone now. Most people today call him J.T. My brother and I call him Daddy. My kids call him Papa. He is the greatest golfer and man I have ever known. No one is even close. His steady, guiding hands and humongous giving heart have guided me and many in life. That guidance and his long ball swing I watched way back then in that pasture sent me in search of other life courses and people that love the game too. That has made all the difference.

Thanks Junior. You gave me the game and so, so, so much more!

Related

• Introduction: Why I’m writing 18 stories for GolfWRX
• Hole 1: The Day I Met Ben Hogan
• Hole 2: Gene says, “Let’s go see Ben”
• Hole 3: Ben Hogan: “I had a dream”
• Hole 4: Ben Hogan had his own math
• Hole 5: Ben Hogan’s “Prototype” fly swatter
• Hole 6: The night Henny Bogan fired me