Great Britain’s 146th Open Championship begins Thursday at Royal Birkdale Golf Club in Southport, England, just north of Liverpool on the Irish Sea. The annual championship, known in America as the “British Open,” currently rotates among multiple UK courses, and this month’s tournament will be Royal Birkdale’s 10th since its first in 1954. During the 2008 British Open there, contestants told the news media that Royal Birkdale was the “most fair” of the courses on the Open rota.
Nine men formed the club in 1889, and members moved it to the present location in 1897 and constructed an 18-hole course. It was then, and remains today, open ground dominated by ridges and hummocks, a seaside expanse the Scots called links or lynkis. The Old the English term for the rough ground near the seashore was hlincas, plural of hlinc; the term “links” has nothing to do with connections, such as pieces of a chain.
The club welcomed women members in 1890, and the first significant tournament held on the course was the 1909 Ladies’ British Open Match Play Championship. In 1935, the members had the course redesigned to route the holes through the valleys and troughs between the dunes rather than over the tops. This allowed splendid vistas for tournament galleries atop the dunes. The club also built a new, art deco clubhouse in 1935.
Birkdale Golf Club had been scheduled to host it first British Open in 1940, but World War II intervened. Between that date and 1954, Birkdale hosted The Amateur Championship, and Curtis and Walker Cup events. British King George VI bestowed the club’s Royal designation in 1951.
Prestwick Golf Club in Scotland hosted the first British Open in 1860. For much of the time since then, The Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews conducted the tournament and managed the rules of golf along with the U.S. Golf Association. In 2004, the Royal and Ancient shifted these administrative and governance functions to a new and separate organization, the “R&A.”
Royal Birkdale has produced memorable highlights during its previous nine Opens.
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1954, Peter Thomson — The first of many
A field of 320 players played two qualifying rounds July 5-6 on two courses, with the top 100 advancing to the 72-hole tournament. Bookies favored South African and three-time Open champion Bobby Locke before the start and listed him at 3-1. After the second round, England’s Bill Spence led the field with a 5-under 141 (par was 73). Argentine Antonio Cerda was one back, and four players trailed by two, including Englishman Sidney Scott, who shot a course record 6-under 67 in the second round. Fifty-two-year-old Gene Sarazen, who won the 1932 Open, advanced to the final 36 holes.
Four men shot 4-under 69s in the third round during the morning of the final day — Scott, Locke, Welshman Dai Rees and Australian Peter Thomson. Scott, the first of the four to finish the afternoon round, shot a 72 for an 8-under 284. Rees needed only a par-4 on the 440-yard 18th to edge by Scott by a stroke, but missed a five-footer and made bogey.
Thomson, 24, who had finished second in the previous two Opens, posted a 283 to take the lead with only Locke still on the course. Needing a birdie on 18 to win, he faced a 35-foot putt. Although Locke reportedly coined the phrase, “You drive for show and putt for dough,” he came up short. The Open win would be the first of many for Thomson, he would win again in 1955, 1956, 1958, and 1965.
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1961, Arnold Palmer — Wet and wild
The first day’s weather was remarkably mild, and three players led the field at 4-under 68 — Dai Rees, South African Harold Henning and Australian Kel Nagle (par had been reduced to 72). But overnight rain and gale winds on Day 2, Thursday July 13, didn’t deter American Arnold Palmer who bested the field with a 1-over 73, a remarkable score given he carded a seven on the 16th hole. That score included a one-stroke penalty after the wind moved his ball in a bunker after he had addressed it. He trailed leaders Rees and Henning after the first 36 holes.
I’ve played in worse conditions before,” Palmer said to reporters afterward, “but not much.”
The night before the final two rounds, storms blew down temporary buildings and tents and forced cancellation of play. On Saturday morning, with crews blotting the soaked greens with blankets and towels, an aggressive Palmer shot a 69, which included a 4-under 32 on the front nine. In the afternoon’s final round, he birdied the par-5 14th hole and that gave him the momentum needed to best runner-up Rees by one shot.
“That was the turning point,” Palmer told the press after receiving the Championship trophy, the “Claret Jug.”
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1965, Peter Thomson — No. 5
Tony Lema, the defending champion led the field in the first round on July 7 with a 5-under 68 (back to par-73), and one reporter wrote of his “smooth, indolent swing.” Betting favorites, Americans Jack Nicklaus and Palmer, trailed by five and two strokes, respectively. Lema and Australian Bruce Devlin led after 36 holes with 4-under 140, and Palmer was one back. Palmer, always a gambler, cut the dogleg in the sixth hole but got into trouble and bogeyed the hole.
The New York Times captured Thomson’s dramatic victory: “In a tumultuous finish that was in doubt all the way down the stretch, the jaunty 35-year-old with the rhythmic swing scored birdies on the last two long holes to shake off Tony Lema’s challenge and win by two strokes.”
This was Thomson’s fifth Open title — his first had been at Royal Birkdale in 1954 — thus joining James Braid and J. H. Taylor with that number of championships; Harry Vardon tops the list with six titles. Tom Watson will later join that group of five-time winners. (1965 was the last year the Open scheduled the final two rounds on the same day.)
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1971, Lee Trevino — Battle with ‘Mr. Lu’
American Lee Trevino, paired with England’s Tony Jacklin in the third round, felt the wrath of the home crowd as the two battled for the lead. The gallery roared in support of Jacklin and cheered when Trevino missed a putt. Afterward, a still simmering Trevino told the press, “At one stage I felt like going into the gallery with my putter.”
The bookies had favored Trevino before the Open’s start on July 7 because of his wins at the U.S. and Canadian Opens during the preceding 19 days. And indeed, Trevino led after the third day at 11-under; Jacklin and Taiwanese golfer Lu Liang Huan were one back.
“Mr. Lu,” as the British media dubbed him, endeared the fans by smiling and doffing his little blue hat after nearly every shot. Trevino posted a 31 on the outward nine and built a six-stroke lead over his pairing partner Lu. But that advantage dwindled precipitously on the back nine, and Trevino led by only one on the 18th tee. Lu’s second shot beaned a woman, Lillian Tipping, in the gallery, but the shaken player rallied to birdie the final hole. Trevino did as well and won the 100th Open with a 14-under 278. (Ms. Tipping was not seriously hurt.)
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1976, Johnny Miller — Final round course record
A 19-year-old Spanish newcomer, Severiano “Seve” Ballesteros, led by two shots on July 9 after the first three rounds. On the first two of those days the weather was miserable, but not the usual wind and rain. Rather, the temperature hit 90 degrees on the dry and dusty course, conditions that led to a small brush fire. Tournament officials allowed a sweaty English player, Brian Barnes, to wear Bermuda shorts.
The course was back to par-72 after offering par-73 in the 1965 and 1971 Opens, and the layout was distinctly asymmetrical: 34-38-72. The front nine had no par-5s, but the inward nine boasted four, all over 500 yards, in the last six holes.
American Johnny Miller surged to the front on the last day, leaving behind Ballesteros, who was plagued in the last round by erratic driving, as well as Nicklaus, Masters champ Ray Floyd, and others. Miller, two behind Ballesteros at the start, fired a course-record 66 to win by six strokes over the Spaniard and Nicklaus. Rookie British pro, Mark James, also shot a 66 that day.
“I’m a heck of a front-runner,” Miller said to the press afterward. “If you put me in the lead, I play way over my head.” Reporters noted that Miller, a Mormon, limited his strong language to “heck.”
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1983, Tom Watson — No. 5
American Craig Stadler, the PGA Tour money leader the previous year, set a high standard in first round scoring with a 7-under 64. (Yes, Open officials had again changed the course layout, reducing par from 73 in 1976 to 71 (34-37). On Day 2, though, an unknown English club pro, Denis Durnian, posted a 28 on the front and broke the Open record for the outward nine. He ended up with a 66 and later finished tied for eighth for the Championship.
Defending champion Watson rose to the front at the end of the third day, July 16, at 8-under, one stroke ahead of Stadler. And the keen competition continued in the fourth round, with eight players tied for the lead at one point. Watson changed all that when he birdied 11, 13, and 16 and led by one stroke.
“All I had to do,” Watson said to reporters later, “was to par in without making any mistakes.”
He indeed parred the par-5 17th and scorched his 2-iron approach on the par-4 18th to within 18 feet. He easily two-putted for his fifth Open Championship. American Hale Irwin tied for second, one stroke behind Watson, and an error in the third round likely kept him out of a tie with Watson. With his ball two inches from the cup on number 14, he lazily attempted to tap it in with the back of his putter — and whiffed.
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1991, Ian Baker-Finch — His one and only
Round one on July 18 offered two big highlights: Ballesteros shot a 4-under 66 on the par-70 layout (another par change), for a one-shot lead before the weather turned vile. Second, as the news media described, “a totally unclothed, unnamed, fair-haired and well-built girl from Bradford, Yorkshire,” ran toward Spaniard Jose Maria Olazabal on the first fairway.
Three relative unknowns led after 36 holes — Gary Hallberg, Andy Oldcorn and Mike Harwood — and a record 113 players made the cut; that year, anyone within 10 strokes of the leader qualified for the weekend. In round three, Australian Ian Baker-Finch enjoyed the improved weather and shot a red-hot 64 to tie American Mark O’Meara for the 54-hole lead. The news media also focused on another odd event in the tournament — Englishman Richard Boxall broke his left leg while hitting his drive on the 9th tee.
On day four, American Jodie Mudd startled everyone on the links by shooting 63, becoming the fifth man to post that score in Open history; he ended up tied for fifth. Baker-Finch carded a final round 66 to win the Championship by two strokes. He had been on the brink of winning previous major titles, but had played poorly in the final round, thus earning the nickname “Baker-Flinch.” His nerves and failing self-confidence ultimately led to his withdrawal from tournament golf in 1997.
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1998, Mark O’Meara — Major No. 2
Tiger Woods, coming off his PGA Tour Player of the Year award in 1997, tied John Huston for the first-round lead with a 4-under 66 in wet and windy conditions. In round two on July 17, lousy weather pushed Woods to a 73, putting him tied for second behind American Brian Watts who stood at 3-under. Also with Woods at 2-under was a 17-year-old amateur, Englishman Justin Rose, who was born in South Africa, and finished the round with eagle-birdie. His 66 tied the 18-hole Open record for an amateur. Watts led after day three at even par, with Masters winner Mark O’Meara tied for second with two others; gallery favorite Rose was in fifth place.
“Every hole, I got an ovation all the way up the hole,” Rose said to reporters afterward. “It was incredible — people shouting out my name.”
O’Meara and Watts were tied at even par at the end of round four, with Tiger’s sparkling 66 placing him in third. But the crowd’s highpoint came when Rose holed a pitch from the rough for a birdie on 18 and a tie for fourth, the best finish by an amateur since 1921. O’Meara beat Watts in a four-hole playoff by two strokes and gained his second major championship of the year.
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2008, Padraig Harrington — Two in a row
Dreadful weather again hampered play in the 137th Open, and that especially didn’t help defending champ, Irishman Padraig Harrington, who began Day One with an injured right wrist. He finished the first round five behind the leaders, but rallied the next day with a 2-under 68 and stood tied for fourth, three behind leader K. J. Choi. In the third round, Australian Greg Norman, who seemed to have been aging gracefully at age 53, gained the lead at 2-over and stood two strokes ahead of Choi and Harrington. Norman and tennis star Chris Evert had just married and were still on their honeymoon.
But in the final round on July 20, Harrington and the wind blew everyone away for a four-shot victory over Brit Ian Poulter; Norman, undone by a 7-over 77, tied for third. Twenty-year-old English amateur, Chris Wood, tied for fifth. Harrington, holding the Claret Jug afterward, said to the media, “I’m holding on to this. I had a great year as Open Champion, so much so I didn’t want to give it back.”
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2017, Up for grabs
U.S. Open champion Brooks Koepka, 27, surely hopes he can follow in the 1971 footsteps of Trevino, who won the U.S. Open and the British Open in the same summer. If successful, Koepka would join an impressive group of five other players besides Trevino who achieved that feat — Bobby Jones (1926, 1930), Gene Sarazen (1932), Ben Hogan (1953), Watson (1982), and Woods (2000).
Similarly, Sergio Garcia must be yearning to add the Open to his Masters win this year as O’Meara did in 1998, plus seven others — Nick Faldo, Gary Player, Woods, Palmer, Watson, Nicklaus and Hogan.
The R&A has set up Royal Birkdale for this year’s Open at 7,156 yards, par-70 (34-36). This layout has no par-5s on the outward nine, and two on the inward nine. Conversely, Royal Birkdale members today play a course that measures 6,817 yards from the tips with par at 72 (35-37). There is one par-5 on the front, and three on the back, all in the last four holes.
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(Michael K. Bohn is the author, among other books, of “Heroes & Ballyhoo: How the Golden Age of the 1920s Transformed American Sports.”)
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