Hi.
My name's Roy Jeomey.
I live in Redondo Beach, California.
I'm playing golf with Fred at Rancho Park. This is Golf Smarter, Episode nine hundred and ninety four.
I've been very lucky. I've spent a lot of time talking with people that knew him well, and there are probably some folks. I think of one of my dearest friends, Sidney Matthew, who's a great golf history down in Tallahassee. Sidney probably knows more about my grandfather than I ever will. And I said, well, you need to tell this story, and Sidney would say to me, no, you do coming from me, it means nothing. He said, I'm going to
tell you a little secret. If you don't tell the stories, then you're leaving it for somebody else too, who may not have the same love for your grandfather that you do. I've never really forgotten that, and so I see that
very much as a responsibility. I've often said that one of the goals is to make my grandfather come alive in color for a new generation, and what that means is seeing him not just as somebody about whom we tell funny stories, is somebody who did great things on the golf course, and all of those things are true, but as somebody that was a real flesh and blood human being who had many, many great personality traits and
many that were not so great. And that's important because if the man becomes a real, honest to God human being, then it kind of makes what he did even more special.
Growing up with the name Bobby Jones comes with pressure and pride with grandson doctor Bob Jones. Four. This is Golf Smarter, sharing stories, tips and insights from great golf minds to help you lower your score and raise your golf IQ.
Here's your host, Fred Green.
Welcome back to the Golf Smarter podcast. Bob.
It's great to be with you, as always, Fred, it's been too long.
It's been a year. Well, no, I think we did something mid year. Did we do something mid year with doctor Joe parent or two years ago?
That was two years ago?
Actually, oh, that's when I came back from my Yeah, yeah, I introduced you guys when I came back and then yeah, I don't remember when it was, but yeah, maybe it's been a year since we've talked to each other. Yeah, Well, on the podcast, we communicate with each other on a regular basis because we've become friends and I'm so touched and honored by your friendship.
Well that goes both ways, Fred, So thank you.
Thank you. So. Now you know, like this week, as always when we talk, it's a week of the Masters. Yes, we're your grandfather, Bob Bobby Jones, created the event, built the golf course, and the legacy continues to grow. Yes, and actually it's coming up to a really big event. The timing of it for your grandfather, correct.
Well it is, well, it is. You know. One of the things that's happened starting in twenty twenty three is we've come up on the one hundredth anniversary of all of my grandfather's major championship wins. In twenty twenty three, we celebrated one hundred year of his one hundred years of his first United States Open victory at Inwood Country Club outside of New York, and then in last year was a one hundredth anniversary of his twenty four US Amateur win at Marion. This year will mark one hundredth
anniversary of the US Amateur victory at Oakmont. Interestingly enough, that is the only time in US Amateur history where the finals have been contested by two members of the same club.
Wow.
Yes, Bubb defeated Watt's Gunn, who was also a member of the Atlanta Athletic Club, and to win his second consecutive United States Amateur in twenty five. Another little tidbit on that that people forget Bub, but Bub beat Watts pretty badly in that final, and of course he beat everybody pretty badly the final, but nobody remembers is Watts played. Remember this is nineteen twenty five. Now, Watts played like ninety holes of golf at even par on Oakmont, which then,
as now, is just a staggering statistic. Yeah, absolutely staggering statistic.
Huh Yeah, that's really remarkable. And help us understand, give us a perspective on how in the days that we're talking about, the early twenties, how important amateur golf was to the game itself, because it's radically changed. It really changed in this century with Tiger.
In this century. Yes, amateur golf in the early really the amateur golf up until probably the nineteen seventies, amateur golf was very much its own game, and it was not necessarily considered to be a feeding ground for the professional for the professional game in the nineteen twenties when my grandfather played, the people who played in the amateur
game were every bit as good as the professionals. Professionals in those days were mainly people who had club jobs who would play in tournaments to supplement their income, and the amateurs, and in fact the amateurs for example, if you were an amateur and I was a professional, you would be listed on the score sheet as mister Fred Green. I would simply be listed on the score sheet as Bob.
Jones because of an I get that, because you.
Were an answer that's correct, you would get mister I would not. And here's the interesting thing. In the United Kingdom, I believe, all the way into the nineteen fifties, I think professionals were not allowed in the clubhouse at all. They would have to change their shoes in the parking lot. Whoa yes. And one of the things that was really
interesting about that too. You also have to remember in a lot of golf tournaments, let's even in professional tournaments, it wasn't a question of the top players in the field. Everybody in the field who made the cut got a paycheck. It wasn't that way at all. If you finished outside the top I don't know. If you finished outside the top twenty, you didn't make anything. And even if you finished in the you know, tied for twentieth, you might make fifty dollars, one hundred dollars.
Yeah, exactly, it wasn't going to pay your expenses for the week, that's for sure.
No, No, That's why the Masters was always a very radical tournament, and that was any professional who teed it up got a check. And there were a lot of things about the Masters that were absolutely radical because that never really sat well with my grandfather that professionals were treated so, as he would say, shabbily by the golfing establishment.
So when he created the Masters, he wanted to make sure that he wanted to make sure that the professionals were treated well, that they were able to come into the clubhouse, that nobody got entered on the scoreboard differently just because of their status within the game, and he wanted to make sure that everybody out a check. Now, some of that was driven by the fact that this is a tournament that's being held in Augusta and early at this point, originally in March, and so he had
to do something to get their interests to come. But it also had to do too with a lot of his own sense of fairness. But yeah, but golf in the twenties, the amateur game in many ways was it.
I mean, I'll give you an idea. In nineteen twenty nine, my grandfather went out to play in the US Amateur not too far from you, in Pebble Beach, and it was the first time the Amateur had ever been contested west of the Mississippi, and that was nineteen twenty nine, and he decided that, you know, back then, of course, if you're going to it's not like you hop on a jet and go out there. You have to take
a train. And he was planning on being on the West coast for a couple of weeks, and so he had made arrangements to go play the opening round at Pasa Tiempo. But any rate he goes out to Pebble Beach, he's expected to go through that field like a hot knife through butter. And instead, in the very first round, he was defeated by somebody that nobody had ever heard of. A guy named Johnny Goodman beat him in the first round.
Nobody had ever heard of Johnny Goodman. Well four years later they would because Johnny Goodman in nineteen thirty three became the last amateur to ever win the United States Open. So that gives you an idea as to just how good the amateur game was. And you know, bub never really had any desire to turn professional. One of the reasons was that he used to just say to sort of shut the conversation up is he would just say, well, you know, there is no money in the pro game.
I could just do better by being a lawyer and this, that and the other, but I had no money in the program. Walter Hagen used to say, yeah, that's nice. If Bob Jones had turned pro, there would have been Yes, that would have changed Hiller.
He was well, he was incredibly popular in American culture, right, I mean, wasn't wasn't Bobby Jones the first person to ever receive a ticker tape parade in New York City, A first golfer, the first golfer.
Yeah, and he's the only golfer to receive two two of them, Yes, one in twenty six and one in thirty amazing. Yes, and in fact, in fact, for a long time he was the only individual to receive two John Glynn became the second and of course John Glenn had to orbit the Earth a few times to do that. Bub just had to hit a little golf ball.
Virginia Earth twice round.
Yes exactly, but yeah, so, but no he was People just do not well think of it this way. In history, there have only been three people that have really moved the knee in terms of the popularity of the game of golf. The first one was Bobby Jones, the second was Arnold Palmer, and the third was Tiger Woods. They brought they both brought tons of people into the game.
There would be There was so much interest that after Bub retired after winning the Grand Slam in nineteen thirty, the USGA begged him to please come out of retirement and play in the nineteen thirty one US Open because they were terrified what would happen to the gate without him there.
Right, And it's a good thing they didn't have TV then.
Well that but the nineteen thirty US Amateur, which was at Marion, which is where they finished up the Grand Slam. That was the first, I believe, one of the first, one of the first golf tournaments to ever be broadcast live on radio and They had like two or three kids who literally would just will unfold this cable all over the golf course. So that's somebody with them microphone.
Oh my, yes, it's not as if it was like Ronald Reagan doing baseball games off of a newswire right.
No, No, they were.
Somebody actually there with a wired microphone running through the course.
Yes, Grantlin Rice was actually the one who did it, and he had a bunch of people. He had a bunch of people following him and Marian. I mean, this is for the United States Amateur and this is in nineteen thirty, you know, you're talking about the early stages of the depression, and there were still fifteen thousand people that came out to watch that final round at Marion. I mean, it's just it's just people just don't They just don't even get how big a deal Bobby Jones was.
And so you know when Warner Brothers hired him to do those instructional videos, which are still pretty darn good. One of the reasons that made them so popular, that was so popular was because nobody most people knew who Bobby Jones was. And they knew who Bobby Jones was, but they'd never seen him hit a golf ball, right.
They've never seen him as it was in broadcast, maybe a photograph, but they'd never seen him hit a.
Ball, never saw him swinging. And then now all of a sudden, you could go to your local movie theater and Bobby Jones will hit golf balls and you'll get to see just how good he was. And it was really is really quite an incredible thing. But I mean, but there's also an interesting side to that as well, because you know he, as I said, I mean, nobody ever really really recognized him because it wasn't like the
twenty four to seven news cycle, right. And so when when they did the second ticker tape parade in New York City that night, Bub was out on this on the street out in front of the Waldorf Astoria, and they were sweeping up the street in front of him, and Bub walked up to this policeman standing there in one of those big New York overcoats, and Bub lit a cigarette and he said to the copy he said, so, so, officer,
what's all the fuss about. And the policeman just looked at him and said, Ah, it's just a parade for some damn golfer.
When we talk about amateur golfers and professional golfers in those days, in the nineteen twenties thirties, so the amateur golfers were the competitive ones. The professional golfers were the golf instructors that were working at courses. But I'm sure that they also made a lot of their living, as quote unquote professional golfers through gambling with people.
Oh most definitely, how did.
That sit with Bub? I mean, because the way you present him as being the proper Atlanta Southern gentleman, I can't imagine he was a big fan of the gambling part of it.
He wasn't a big fan of gambling on his own, but he was. Bub was very much. Bub very much had a laissez faire attitude towards what other people did. I also have to remember, too, that two of his dearest friends were people who were not always held up as paragons of virtue, one of course, being Walter Hagen and the other being Ty Cobb, the George Peach. And yeah,
so Bub was Bub was, actually he was. He was very What other people wanted to do as long as they were pleasant company was fine with him.
Interesting, Okay, yeah, okay. We talk about the amateur play and how Tiger changed the game, and but Tiger was amateur champ for three years in a row. He was recently on the podcast We had Steve Scott on and he tells the story about in Tiger's third championship, Amateur Championship, they were paired together as the final group, and he tells a great story about about helping Tiger move his ball marker.
Tiger was getting ready to putt, is what it was.
So you know, you remember that event.
I saw it on TV. I didn't see you couldn't hear it, but I mean if you were watching the broadcast, you saw it, right. But it was just Tiger had marked his ball and had moved his mark because it was in Steve's line, and Tiger wasn't obviously thinking, and he went to just put his ball back down and he was about to pick up his mark, and Steve, in probably one of the greatest displays of sportsmanship I've ever seen, said Tiger, you need to move your mark back.
That's the name of his book, it.
Is, And Tiger was like, oh, thanks, and he moved the mark back and then made the putt.
To make the putt to win.
Correct.
If he didn't tell him, it would have been a two stroke penalty and Steve would have won.
Well, it would have been Actually, no, it wouldn't have been it was match play. It would have been an automatic loss of hole. Oh okay, it would have been a loss of hole same but same outcome. Yes, yeah, you're right. It would have been two strokes if it were stroke play, right, okay, but match play would have just been loss of hole. But the outcome that would have been the same effect. Yes, Tiger, you need to
move you. I wrote Steve a letter and I said, you know, that may be one of the finest acts of sportsmanship that I have ever seen. You did, yes, And he, in fact, Steve sent me a copy of his book that it was written by It was ghost written with well, Trip Bowden wrote it with him. Trip's a very dear friend of mine and also as the son of a fellow member of mine at Sage Valley Golf Club in South Carolina.
Okay, okay, yeah, amazing story.
It's a small world, yeah, but.
It's and for everybody to know. Here's a great tip that came out of that is that when you move your ball flip your marker over.
Yes, you know who taught me that was there was a guy, a pro, a pro that I knew when I was a teenager and had aspirations hopefully playing playing golf competitively. I never did. I've never been competitive in golf.
Have fun. But I mean he told me. He told me, he said, yeah, always make sure mark your ball with a quarter or whatever coin you use, and mark it heads up, and then when you move, have to move your marker, flip it to tails so that you can you will always know by looking at that quarter or that coin whether you need to move your mark he said. Of course. Then the real trick is remembering where do you have to move it too?
Hopefully we're lining it up. But I mean, even the people that I've told that tip to since I've learned it from Steve was like, everyone's like, oh, that's a great tip. It's one of those tips that it's like, oh, so simple. It falls in with the never if you have to take you're going from your golf cart path only whatever, and you're going up to the green and you have to bring a wedge with you, you never just put your wedge down. You put it down between the flag, yes, and your cart.
Yes, so you.
Never go to the next toll going I don't have my wedge anymore.
Right, that's right.
That's another one. That's great tips that I've learned just from having these kind of conversations. Yes, so I want to know, I want to go back about what stories do you have? And it's my favorite part of this year. Stories you have about Bub and Ty Cobb.
Well, they were just very very good friends. You know, they were both from Georgia. They frequently would go hunting in South Georgia together Ty Cobb. At one point, I forget what tournament it was, but is one of the national championships. And Cobb was following my grandfather and they came onto this par three and there was like four groups waiting on this par three. And so when Cobb got up to the tee, he found my grandfather just sitting on the ground and he chewed my grandfather out.
He said, you never sit when you're in competition. It's going to tighten up your it's going to tighten up your hip muscles, it's going to kill your rotation and you won't get that back for two or three holes. And so Bub always made sure after that that he never would he never would sit down.
Uh.
You know, Cobb was one of these guys, though he actually got a much worse reputation than he really deserved.
He he me for being a racist asshole.
Yeah, there's actually been a couple of really interesting books that actually say that that really wasn't true. Really, a lot of this was the image that Cobb wanted to portray, for example, like that, yeah that actually like like the things about like on the baseball diamond, He actually was very fine sportsman, even though he would do stuff like you know.
Back then they with his cleats up.
Well, but not even that, wait, well they all did that. For What he would do was they would show pick. These guys would like look over in the dugout when Ty Cobb was in the dugout and he had his shoe off and he had a file in his hand and he was filing the spikes. So the message being he's coming in cleets up and those things are sharp.
Exactly, they have traction, Definitely.
They definitely had traction. But yeah, but you know, bub bub Bub definitely had some friends who qualified as characters.
Oh I bet well he was.
He was in his own way.
Yeah, you know you were his grandson. He wasn't playing golf, he wasn't well as you were conscious. How do you know this stuff? I mean, I never called you out on these stories, going, wait a minute, how do you know?
Here's the beauty of it. Here's the beauty of it. You know, you know, Fred will never know. I could just be making it all up. Who's going to call me out? Right? Actually, I've been very lucky. I've spent a lot of time talking with people that knew him well. And there are probably some folks. I think of one of my dearest friends, Sidney Matthew, who's a great golf historian, a fantastic lawyer down in Tallahassee. And Sydney and I Sidney probably knows more about my grandfather than I ever will,
and since told me a lot of this stuff. And I said, well, you need to tell this story. And Sydney would say to me, no, you do, he said, for me, coming from me, it means nothing, But you need to tell the stories. And he said, I'm going to tell you a little secret. He said, I'm going to tell you a little secret. If you don't tell the stories, then you're leaving it for somebody else too, who may not have the same love for your grandfather
that you do. I've never really forgotten that, and so I see that very much as a responsibility that I have. I've often said that one of the goals that I would like is to make my grandfather come alive in
color for a new generation. And what that means is seeing him not just as somebody about whom we tell funny stories, somebody who did great things on the golf course, which and all of those things are true, but as somebody that was a real, flesh and blood human being who had many, many great personality traits and many that were not so great. And that's important because if you make if the man becomes a real, honest to God human being, then it kind of makes what he did
even even more special and certainly more important. So so I take this response. I mean, I have fun with it, but but it's serious because you know, I'm not getting any younger, Fred, I'm going to be sixty eight in another few months, and you know, you start, you get you get to your late sixties, and you start thinking about what's the legacy that I want to leave behind, which I don't want to do anytime soon.
It's interesting that you talked about your feeling and getting that advice about carrying on the legacy of your grandfather and better for you to do it than somebody else. When growing up in the Atlanta area with the name Bobby Jones Bob Jones, was that difficult as a child or was that did you feel like there was attention on you? I don't want to ask too many questions because I want to let you answer the question. But
about the attention, you know, positive negative? However, what was that like for you?
Well, it was difficult. First of all. I did not grow up in the Atlanta area though, I grew up in western Massachusetts. But I was born in nineteen fifty seven and in the nineteen fifties and sixties, though it really didn't matter where you grew up. If you had a name like Bobby Jones, it was everybody knew that. Sure, yeah, And there was always a certain amount of pressure that came with it. I mean, number one, the pressure was the question do you play golf? And you know, my father,
of course went through that same thing. And my dad was actually a very fine player. He was a plus three handicap at his peak, but you know, played in three national amateurs and yet he always felt he was a very second rate golfer. Well, yeah, compared to who he was, you know, looking who he was compared to. Yes, my handicap at its best got down to a minus three, which is still not too shabby.
No, but it's not too ere quality. But it's really impressive.
It's comfortable, and up until a year and a half ago it was always in single digits. But you know, I mean I always thought of myself as just not too terribly good. But again, of considering who I'm compared to, I think I think it was much harder on my dad than it was for me, but it was still awfully intimidating on me. Like, for example, I for many years could not play golf club play with clubs that had my grandfather's signature on them because I just couldn't
look at it. It was too intimidating. So if I got a club from Spalding that had the Jones logo on it, I'd either have the decal put out on the toe of the club where I couldn't see it, or I would just have the top of the club just made solid, solid in color. And you know that eventually changed and I actually got to a point where I would have I started using this back in the old days. I was using Tony Penno woods. And first thing I did when I'd get a penna that Pe
used to make clubs for McGregor. They were really wonderful and I would make I would whenever I would get a penna, the first thing I do is I'd have it stripped down and then refinished and I would have a Jones signature on top of them.
Why because by that time I liked it ok.
And I wanted to see my grandfather's name on it. And the joke was the guy said, we you know, really I shouldn't do this because it's not a spalding club and we shouldn't put a spalding sticker on a non spalding club. But considering that's your name too, we can just say we're putting your name club. So, yeah, it was difficult, But did you As I've gotten older, it's gotten easier.
Yeah. Were there ever times in your life where people tried to take advantage or get in close because oh I can maybe I can get somewhere because the name is Bobby Jones Or did you ever feel that was happening to you?
It does, that happened. But you know, one of the things growing up is that in my family is that we are My father and my mother were very good at training my sisters in me how to deal with situations like that and to deal with them graciously and so that kind of that that helped a lot. So, you know, so generally speaking, like we were always taught. You know, you're going to have people who come out of the woodwork every February and they're only coming out for one reason.
Tickets.
Yeah, yeah, And I mean it's okay, I don't mind, you know, I don't, but you know, you know when it's going to happen. You've I guess this is so far we've made it. I guess about half an hour into this, I've yet to be called golf royalty, but I guess.
Uh, I'm going there.
You know, you're going there. One of the things is is that we were taught very definitely how do you conduct yourself in those circumstances. How do you learn.
How to navigate the fact that you've got a first degree blood relation who is to this day one hundred years after his greatest accomplishments and one hundred and what this year, it's one hundred and twenty three years after his birth.
Is still larger than life. How do you deal with that? You know? And I'm very fortunate in that I had good parents who taught me how to do that and how to do that with some grace and decorum in a way that leaves people comfortable having dealt with me. And I'm also very fortunate in that I've got some good friends. I'm thinking particularly a friend of mine, Charlie Yates,
very here in Atlanta. You know, Charlie and I we share an awful lot of background together, and uh, you know, we have a lot of trust with each other because you know, he's part of one of the great GalF families of the state of Georgia, and uh we we've had to contend with a lot of the same stuff over the years. So I don't wish I could do it half as well as Charlie does.
Yeah. So, as we're recording this weeks before it's being published, and it's being published as we I always want to.
Do, actually recording this on Bub's birthday.
Oh Saint Patrick's day. That's awesome. Happy birthday, Bob, Happy birthday. Great. Well, it's being well being published this the week of the Masters, as I do every year because it's perfect to have you on at that time, and interestingly enough, this year, as this show is being published, I am in Atlanta. I am actually in Georgia. Yes, I am going with a friend who invited me to go to the Masters.
We're hoping to go practice around Wednesday and go to a tournament round on Thursday, play golf the rest of the week. But he gets his tickets from a mutual friend of his, Charlie Yates Junior. So talk about it all coming back around.
Me tell you, let me tell you Charlie is. Charlie is an incredible guy. He besides a very successful career, Charlie is probably he probably wouldn't like me saying this, but I mean, Charlie has done so much in support
of the YMCA here in Atlanta. And then one of the things that he has done that is he has been absolutely instrumental, in no pun intended, in bringing about this renaissance that the Atlanta Opera has experienced over the last ten or fifteen years, to the point now to where the Atlanta Opera is considered one of the ten
finest opera houses in the United States. And that's to a large extent, Charlie would never agree with this, but that to a large extent is due to his absolutely relentless work in developing helping develop that company.
Well, Charlie Yates Senior, Yes, has a history in professional golf. Correct, I mean we're talking about Charlie late Charlie Yates like people were assuming people know who that is. But explain Charlie's legacy.
Well, Charlie Yates, he didn't like being called Charlie Yates senior. But Charlie Yates was a very very fine amateur golfer who grew up at the Atlanta Athletic Club. And in fact, he used to say how he used to sneak under the fence at the Athletic Club to go watch Bobby
Jones play golf. And he said that the highlight of his time as a young man was when he would go into the when he would go into the clubhouse and Bob Jones would buy him a bottle of Coca Cola, or, as Charlie used to call it, the great Elixir of Atlanta and Charlie became a really outstanding amateur golfer. He
won the NCAA title when he was at Tech. He won the British Amateur in nineteen thirty eight at Royal Troon and in fact he played in the Walker Cup that year and unfortunately the United States team lost the Walker Cup. And I believe it was at the Old Course in St. Andrews. And when Charlie was brought up at the trophy presentation, before the trophy was presented, Charlie
led everybody. He said, there's just one thing I can add to all of this, and he started singing the old Scottish song A Wee Doc and Doris, which is in Scottish, which is Scottish for a week, a small Scotch and soda. And several people had said that Charlie Charlie got more mileage out of A Wee Doc and Doris than Bing Crosby did out of White Christmas. But Charlie was a member of Augusta National almost from the very beginning. He was the he handled the press for decades.
So in addition to being an outstanding golfer, he also made great contributions to the game of golf. He won the Bob Jones Award one year, for which the USGA gifts for sportsmanship. But even more than that were the contributions that he made to the city of Atlanta. Not the least I mean, good Lord, not the least of which was he was instrumental in the development of the
Woodroff Arts Center, which is no small achievement. I mean, in many, many ways, Charlie is one of those people that which Atlanta is what it is today, and his son has continued in that same legacy. It's really quite it's really I'm kind of amazed they let me hang on to them like a pilot fish.
But it's interesting because you talked about how your father being the son of the famous person at such a difficult time, at much more difficult time than you did, carrying that name, and so that puts Charlie, your friend Charlie into that position of being the first generation removed from the fame. Did he do you know if he's had those struggles as well, or because he.
Has, it hasn't shown. So if he has, he's certainly learned, he's certainly mastered the art well. Much like my grandfather said to a young man at Pasa Tiempo when he said, Bob, how do you play in front of all these people? Don't you get nervous? And Bub looked back at him and said, I get horribly nervous. The trick is not to let them see it.
I'm gonna dig into this a little bit deeper. And I appreciate you answering, and if you don't, we'll move on. So we we we talk about you know, you being third generation but also being raised with how to handle yourself. And I'm sure I don't remember you have siblings. I do you do have siblings? You have probably have cousins as well. All right, so you and and we all kind of grew up in the rebellious sixties and seventies. So did everybody buy into this? Of your siblings and cousins?
Did you all buy into this? Yes, we understand how we're supposed to carry ourselves. Or were there son that's like, yep, moving to California, go buy I don't want to be part of this.
Well, no, not to California necessarily, but we did have people go well, my sister went to New York. But nonetheless, when it came to having to do things that are related to the family. Yes, we all bought into it. One of the things that I've always thought was really fascinating is that the seven of us in this generation sometimes, like any family, we will fight like cats and dogs.
But when it comes to issues about our family business or about our grandfather and his legacy, if you've spoken to one of us, you've spoken to all of us. It's really I don't know too many families that have gotten two, you know, in the second generation, removed from the person who was the famous person where you could find that type of agreement. I just don't know of too many, but we do so, Yeah, we do so.
Right now, as I mentioned, I'm strolling the grounds of Augusta National. I'm like freaking out, having a blast. I already know this. This is weeks and events, and I know that I'm going to be going out of my mind here, especially going well, I don't have a camera. I need a camera. No, sorry, you cannot.
The most important thing is not a camera. It's a credit card.
Go ahead, go ahead, yeah right, Oh, that's my lifeline, is what it is. Can you walk us all through, because you know, getting to go to the Masters is not something you could just go on stub hub and buy tickets, and this is a very very tough ticket to get A and B. It is the biggest week of the PGA's year, no question about it.
PGA Tour this week of the entire golf world.
Absolutely yeah. Now that it now that the golf world is kind of moved beyond the PGA Tour, it is, it is it, and I'd love it if you can like give us a tour of what a week is like and what your week is like at Augusta National.
Well, it's been a long time since I've gone for the entire week. Normally, I just go on the weekend because I do this thing called work.
Literally, I just go for the weekend. I know, come on, you're going to the Masters every year anyway, But it's work there.
Well no, I mean I work during the week. No.
I understand that you're talking to me from your office right now and you're a psychoical clinical psychologists, right right, okay, so but still the family work. Yes, this is what you're doing when you're going to the Master.
Very much, very much. Royalty is there and I appreciate that, thank you. But you know, I think going to the Masters, especially when people go for the first time. I think the most important thing is just to take it in. There are two ways to get into the Masters, legal ways, I should say. One is that you get to drive down Magnolia Lane. The second one, which is in many ways as impressive, is you come in through the main gate on the what would be the eastern side of
the property, which is probably where you'll come in. And what happens is you go through the security and you go underneath what used to be Berkman's Road, and then you come up the other side of it into the sunlight, and all of a sudden you are in. You're on AUGUSTA National, and you'll see the press buildings on the left, the press building on the left, which my dear friend Martin Davis once said, that press building is so impressive. He said, is what it is what God would have
built if he had the money. And you'll see just buildings down the right side of your walkway and just all like that, gleaming white with the dark dark green shutter or black. They're so dark they're almost black and it might be black now, and you'll just see that. And as you walk down you'll see the practice tea coming up on your left, and it's like the sense of antisse a patient that just builds as you get closer. And then you turn right and you go down into
the patron's pavilion. That's where you need your credit card, by the way, and then you just go a little bit farther and you walk underneath these trees, and then all of a sudden there's that big main scoreboard on the right and this vista of the golf course right in front of you. And I always say to people, just don't be in a hurry to get to the golf course. Really savor every step that you take getting to it, because there's nothing like it in the entire
world of sports. And then if you get there early enough in the day, one of the things that I would suggest you do, even before you do any retail therapy, is walk down to Amen corner, especially before the players start getting there, so you can just see it. So you can just see it, and it's there. There is no place in the entire golf world that is as impressive as Augusta National in the springtime. It is it
is just there is nothing nothing like it. The other thing, I mean, the other stuff is a little bit more practical. I mean, if you're going to do any shopping, best to do that in the middle of the day, when the traffic is a little bit less. But one other but that's who cares. Let me give you the big advice. If you really want to see the golf course, best way to see it walk it backwards. Oh, walk it backwards so that you're not walking with like all of a sudden you get caught up in a group and
you're like ten deep. You're constantly going against the grain, and so you get to see more. And then there are wonderful, wonderful grand stands through out where you get to see multiple scenes from the same location. So I mean, it's just if you just have like one or two days to go, just I would just say, savor it. The tendency is to get so anxious about it that I got to see it all. Now you really don't,
You really don't. There are certain parts I like to see, Like my favorite hole is the one probably not many people's favorite, but on the front nine my whole. My favorite hole is number five. What well, not so much now, but it used to be the most strategically demanding golf hole on the entire golf course and back back in the seventies, particularly the approach into number five was I mean really challenging. You could either, you know, vomb it into the green or you could play a run up
shot into the green. I mean, the t shot was really really demanding. Now that they've stretched the hole out to where it's about eight zillion yards long, some of that strategy has kind of gone away. And that's nothing really bad. I mean, they've had to do it because the game has just changed. But five is a great one to see. My favorite hole in the back nine. Most people might find this surprising, but strangely enough, my favorite hole in the back nine is the only hole
on the entire golf course that doesn't have a bunker. Fourteen, right, I love fourteen. It is the wildest hole because it's got a putt. When they cut the pin on the left hand side, on the back left, you can stand and look at that putt. If you're right of that hole, you can stand and look at that putt and you will swear to me, Fred Green, this putt is moving left right, but it doesn't it breaks right much, but it does move right. Okay, incredibly challenged.
So you just gave me an incredibly important view for me to have as a tour guide. Yes, I was asking about what's it like for you, Bob Jones the fourth when you're there? Are you there as a fan only or no?
I'm there. I am there because the club is very generous and make sure that my wife and I have a very nice credential. But I'm also there because I mean, I'm representing my grandfather and I'm representing my family, and I never, I never try to forget that, and I don't know that I could forget it even if I if I could.
Are there? Do they have official duties that they.
No, No, no, they are perfectly content just to let you come and just enjoy, and they provide wonderful credentials. And we do have a wonderful time. And what's the most important thing at Augusta, strangely enough, even more than the golf course, is I get to see people that I only see that one time of year, sure, and yet I've seen them every year for forty five years. Forty yeah, forty years. And sometimes you know, we're getting
together and we're talking about friends of ours that aren't here. Anymore, and we're remembering them. And most of the time we're remembering people, we're remembering people with a smile. And you know, that's one of the great things about the Masters. Is it partially because it's the time of year, partially because it's the place, and partially it's because the man of the man who founded the tournament. But it is in many ways it is the ultimate, even more than Baseball's
opening day. It is the right of spring. It really is.
Yeah, yeah, and actually it really does, especially especially for the golf world. It's like, oh good, the Masters. That means I can go start warming up again.
That's right. I mean, you got to understand, for half the country, the country is either has either just dug out of snow or digging out of snow. And this is sort of the sign. I mean, the azaleas are blooming, the flowers and the dogwoods are blooming. And if the azaleas aren't blooming, I'm sure they'll find a way to make the bloo.
I mean, you know, other than the Masters, it's really like the Ryder Cup, you know, team golf that really makes the everyone stop, but nothing like the Masters. And even more so now that We're oversaturated on baseball with you know, games every day and uh spring training and stuff, and the inn League play on opening day makes me just I don't even want to get started with that one. But no, the Masters really is this sign that everything is going to be okay in the world.
The only the only thing in sports that I think even remotely compares with it. There are two things that are and it's going to sound strange when I say it, but there are two things in sports that will remotely compare with the Masters.
Okay.
Number one is Wimbledon, sure, held at the same place every year. It is that sports hallmark event. It really is, right. And the second is, and I'm almost scared to say this, the Daytona five hundred.
Well different, k I know that the Daytona five hundred is the super Bowl of stock car racing NASCAR, but it's the opening of the season. But it doesn't signify springtime like those two that you just brought.
That one held it's still held in the winter.
Yeah, right, So the Masters really says everybody, come on outside, it's beautiful, We're going to get to play now for a couple months.
Wimbledon is held in the middle of.
The summer exactly. Yeah, it's an important event for the sport, but it doesn't mean for the culture what the Masters really significant.
Funny because, and it's so funny because because that wasn't the original plan for the Masters. Sure, it was originally supposed to be in March, and when they finally decided to move it to April, they decided to move it
to the first full week of April. And the funniest part is that somebody went to Cliff Roberts and they said to him, mister Roberts, don't you understand that if you move this tournament to the first full week of April about once or twice every four or five years, that Sunday of the Masters is going to overlap with Easter Sunday. And Cliff said, well, can't they move it?
Did he say, oh, but it's also passover?
No he didn't.
He didn't say that.
No.
Yeah, Now, did we complete in the beginning of our conversation, you were talking about the Bobby Jones Centennial? Did we complete the lineup of what's going on? What's happening in twenty twenty five?
Well, we get there, five, we have don't have anything set yet. For twenty twenty see, but that will be the centennial will be at Oakmont this year, and we're hoping we can get something worked out with them. I was lucky enough to be able to go to Inwood Country Club in twenty twenty three and play golf, play around of golf there on the actual one hundredth anniversary
day that you won. And then last September I went to Marion and played around at Marion, not on one hundredth anniversary, but it was in the same month at least, and then spoke at a dinner there that night. The funniest part was I went there with a big leg injury, and so I was walking around Marian's a walking only golf course. My wife was with me, and Mimi said to me, on about the third hole, she could see I was in really bad pain, and she said, Bobarre,
you sure you want to do this. I said, Honey, this is Marion. I don't care if somebody has to come out and drag me around this golf course. I'm finishing this round.
Here you go.
Yeah. So I did a man. Now I was a man. I was in agony for about two weeks afterwards, but it was worth every bit of it.
Well. As always, this conversation is one of my favorite of the year, not not just because of the history that I get to learn that I don't really know much about, but I get a perspective on the history. And you and I have so much fun together. I mean, we do really come right down to it. We both enjoy doing this together. And I really appreciate you coming on this show and saying nice things about it and being available for me. So we can have this conversation.
Well, you know, and I can do it outside of the outside of the month of April too, So just so you.
Know, well we've had you on talking with doctor Joe parent that's right, you know, it's I want yeah, absolutely doctors so perfect to have you now, it is, yeah, And hopefully you know you have not I did not ask you for the tickets. You have not gotten these tickets, And so I hope I get to see you when I'm when I there, because I really would love to meet you face to face.
I would It's hard to believe after a number of years that we've never actually met in person.
No, it's that. Yeah, I definitely hope we can do that. We tried last year we did and couldn't do it and something came up. But that's okay, that's life, and try to get here.
We're getting there.
Doctor Bob Jones, the fourth always a pleasure to have one of the show.
That pleasure is mine and I just loved doing this. It's good to see you, my friends.