Against All Odds, He Blazed A Trail

Seventy-five different men have won the Los Angeles Open, the venerable PGA Tour event now known as The Genesis Invitational. Of those 75 champions, no one had a more harrowing journey to the winner’s circle than Charlie Sifford.

The first African American to compete regularly on the PGA Tour, Sifford was born in Charlotte, N.C. in 1922. Caddying introduced him to golf, and he soon decided he wanted to make a living from the game — but as a professional golfer.

SIFFORD IN 2011 AT THE HALL OF FAME INDUCTION CEREMONY.

At age 17, however, reality hit Sifford like a Joe Louis uppercut. He lived for practicing and playing, but was told he could no longer do so at the club where he caddied. He couldn’t go elsewhere in town because Black people were barred from playing the area’s public courses.

“For the first time in my life I was categorically told that I couldn’t play golf anymore,” recalled Sifford in his aptly named 1992 autobiography, Just Let Me Play. It wouldn’t be the last time, either.

GREAT BARRIERS

In 1940, Sifford bolted for Philadelphia to live with an uncle. In the City of Brotherly Love, Charlie at least found tolerance. “I was both surprised and delighted to see both blacks and whites playing side by side [at Cobbs Creek Municipal Golf Course],” wrote Sifford.

Over time, he met and competed with the greatest Black golfers — Howard Wheeler, Bill Spiller and especially Teddy Rhodes — the stars of the United Golf Association’s tour, a circuit made up of small tournaments for Black professionals. Sifford won the tour’s most prestigious event, the National Negro Open, six times. Still, he yearned to compete on the PGA Tour. Unfortunately, the feeling wasn’t mutual.

The PGA of America, which oversaw the PGA Tour in those days, then had a Caucasians-only clause in its requirement for membership. Sifford won the Long Beach Open in 1957, with many big names in the field, but it was not an official PGA Tour event. Belatedly, in November 1961, the PGA repealed
the Caucasians-only clause, but by then Charlie was 39 years old. He had been shut out during his prime playing years.

Twenty-first century golf fans may remember Sifford from decades-old grainy footage of a cigar-chomping, taciturn golfer with a homemade, roundhouse swing. Nevertheless, that swing was sufficiently reliable to put him frequently in contention. Finally, in August 1967, Sifford smashed through the barrier and captured a PGA Tour event, the Greater Hartford Open.

TRIUMPH IN TINSELTOWN

Civil rights and racial issues were front burner topics during the turbulent 1960s. Dozens of prominent examples rocked the sports pages, from Muhammed Ali’s legal troubles to raised fist protests at the 1968 Olympics.

Golf was not immune. On January 9, 1969, SoCal Golf Hall of Famer Jim Murray, the Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist for the Los Angeles Times, penned this about Sifford: “Before Charlie Sifford, if a Negro walked on a golf green in this country, chances are he was carrying somebody else’s clubs and/or a wet towel to wipe somebody else’s ball.

“If he was in the grille room, he was carrying somebody else’s coffee. He came to fix a shower, not take one. “Golf was not a game for ghettoes. Neither did it leave any time for carrying picket signs, joining demonstrations or running for office. Charlie birdied, not talked, his way through social prejudice. He broke barriers by breaking par. His weapon was a 9-iron, not a microphone. Charlie stands as a social pioneer not because he could play politics but because he could play golf.”

He sure could play. The very morning Murray’s column ran, the 46-year-old Sifford scorched Rancho Park with an 8-under-par 63 to lead the Los Angeles Open. Three steady 71s ultimately earned him a playoff with Harold Henning. Sifford resided in Los Angeles at the time, so his wife Rose, toddler son Craig and son Charles Jr., a student at Cal State Long Beach, were among those in the gallery. Sifford ended the suspense in dramatic fashion when he planted a 9-iron to three feet on the first playoff hole.

Charlie Sifford earned his spot in the SoCal Golf Hall of Fame in 2011 not because he once lived in the Southland or because he once captured the Los Angeles Open. He’s enshrined because he blazed a trail for minority golfers for generations to come, and for having persevered amid daunting conditions against fantastic odds.

He certainly impressed a young Southern California golfer named Tiger Woods. Tiger called Sifford “the Grandpa I never had” — and named his first son, “Charlie.”

Despite winning two PGA Tour events, Charlie Sifford never got invited to play in the Masters. When Tiger Woods won the Masters in 1997, Sifford shed a few tears. Charlie Sifford finally had his moment at Augusta. ▪