Elder broke Augusta National color barrier 40 years ago

The picture, now more than 40 years old, says it all.

Lee Elder, wearing checkered pants and a white golf shirt, practically leaps off the page of an old newspaper clipping. A big smile is stretched across his face and his arms are raised.

He had just made an 18-foot birdie putt to win the Monsanto Open on the fourth hole of a playoff against Peter Oosterhuis. And along with the $30,000 winner’s purse came a bonus: an invitation to the Masters Tournament.

Elder became the first black golfer to receive the coveted invitation. Charlie Sifford and Pete Brown had never made it despite PGA Tour wins in the 1960s.

And now, a man who grew up hustling on public courses and fighting to make his way on the PGA Tour, was bound for Augusta National Golf Club and a date with history.

The signifigance was not lost on him.

“For the color barrier in golf to stand that long, to finally see it fall at Augusta, was something I was happy to be a part of,” Elder said.

APRIL 1974 WAS a historic month for black athletes.

On April 8, Hank Aaron broke Babe Ruth’s all-time home run record when he blasted Al Downing’s pitch over the left-centerfield wall at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium. Aaron had broken one of sport’s most hallowed marks, but it wasn’t an easy path for the Atlanta Braves slugger. Nearly three decades after Jackie Robinson broke baseball’s color barrier, Aaron was dogged by hate mail and death threats as he closed in on No. 715.

“A black man is getting a standing ovation in the Deep South for breaking a record of an all-time baseball idol,” Dodgers broadcaster Vin Scully said on his call. “And it is a great moment for all of us, and particularly for Henry Aaron.”

Thirteen days after Aaron’s historic home run, Elder got his first PGA Tour victory. But it wasn’t easy.

According to Associated Press reports, Elder birdied the final two holes at Pensacola (Fla.) Country Club to force the playoff with Oosterhuis. Then he and the Englishman matched shots over the first three playoff holes before Elder settled matters with his dramatic birdie.

Like Aaron before him, Elder had plenty of time to reflect on what was headed his way.

Aaron had finished the 1973 season with 713 career home runs and had a long off-season that was filled with questions and buildup.

Elder’s victory in Pensacola gave him almost a full year to prepare for his Augusta debut.

“Right away I became an instant celebrity,” Elder said. “Everyone wanted me to come and speak at banquets, play at exhibitions. I was weighing about 165 pounds when I won the tournament. By the time I got to the Masters, a year later, I was over 200 pounds. I was on the banquet circuit.”

Elder made 19 of 20 cuts in 1974, but didn’t come close to winning after his breakthrough. He had earnings of $67,777 and finished in the top 10 in three events.

Elder reached out to Aaron for advice.

“We had a chance to talk about it,” he said. “We talked about different things that we had been confronted with and how we felt about them.”

INITIALLY, THERE WAS confusion over whether Elder would even play in the Masters.

Augusta National and Masters chairman Clifford Roberts issued a statement right after Elder’s victory and said “he has earned his invitation” and “we are very delighted.”

Elder said, “Tell Mr. Roberts I’ll see him at the Masters.”

But then he changed his tune.

“I’ll have to weigh it carefully,” Elder said shortly after his win. “There’s a lot of tournaments and a lot more playing to be done between now and then. Anything can happen.”

A day after the victory, Elder confirmed that he would indeed play. His wife reported that the phone had been ringing nonstop at their Washington home, and that more than 50 messages had been left on the answering machine.

“If there is any doubt in anyone’s mind, I’m accepting right now,” he told the Associated Press. “There is no doubt about it.”

The reason for the doubt was easy. No black golfer before him had been invited to play, even though Sifford and Brown had won official events on the PGA Tour.

Brown, who now lives in Evans, was the first black to win a PGA Tour event. He won the Waco Turner Open in 1964, and later added the Andy Williams-San Diego Open in 1970. Neither win got him invited to play at Augusta.

Sifford, who died earlier this year, integrated the PGA Tour in 1961. He also won two PGA Tour events, the 1967 Greater Hartford Open and the 1969 Los Angeles Open. Like Brown’s wins, neither earned him a berth in the Masters.

Masters qualifications have changed through the years. The tournament began as an invitation-only event, with friends and former competitors of co-founder Bobby Jones filling the early fields. But as the tournament rose in stature, more formal standards were issued.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, when Brown and Sifford were at the top of their games, PGA Tour winners didn’t receive automatic invites.

For professionals, top finishes in the other majors, making a Ryder Cup squad, or finishing in the top eight on a points list from the finish of the last Masters to the start of the current Masters were the best ways to get in.

There also was a ballot in place for past champions to vote in a player, either amateur or professional, who was not already eligible.

For 1972, tournament officials did away with the points system and the past champions ballot and began inviting winners of PGA Tour events.

THE BUILDUP FOR the 1975 Masters was two-pronged. There was Elder and his highly anticipated debut at the Masters. And there was the expected battle between golf’s all-time major championship winner, Jack Nicklaus, and the hottest player of the season, Johnny Miller.

Miller had won three times early in the season, and Nicklaus had added a pair of wins in the month leading up to the Masters. Tom Weiskopf, also a top player, had triumphed the week before Augusta.

The buildup for Elder, who was 40, affected his game leading into the Masters. He had missed three cuts in a row, hadn’t finished higher than 33rd and had made less than $5,000.

“I go to bed thinking about the Masters,” Elder told Bob Green of the AP that March. “I dream about the Masters. I wake up thinking about the Masters.”

National magazines and the big newspapers had turned their attention to Elder, a momentary diversion from the big stories playing out that spring: the war in Vietnam and the kidnapping of Patty Hearst.

By the time he arrived in Augusta, Elder was worn out from all the attention.

Elder checked in on Monday of tournament week but refused to talk to the media, instead opting to play a handful of holes.

“I tried to play some practice rounds,” Elder said. “What happened was the press was bombarding me on every move that I made. Even when I was practicing they would come out. ‘Lee, I need to talk to you.’ Lee this, Lee that. They all wanted one-on-one interviews.”

Elder also had some interaction with Roberts, the stern chairman of Augusta National and the Masters.

“It was hard to really figure out what exactly the type of person he was going to be when you met him,” Elder said. “He tried to show a presence of welcome, but I know deep down he didn’t care about opening his arms up to me and saying the things that he would have liked to have said. So I accepted it.

“I know it was a hard time for him also. Not only just me, but also because of the fact that here is a black who had qualified to compete at the Masters.”

Elder set up a media session, with Roberts’ help, for Tuesday, then focused on getting ready for the tournament.

He had hired veteran Augusta National caddie Henry Brown, a fine player in his own right, to guide him around the course.

Off the course, Elder and his wife, Rose, made special preparations after he had received threats.

“The only thing I had to do to be on the safe side was to rent two homes,” Elder said. “And then change staying in homes. So that way if the incident were going to occur they didn’t know where I was going to be at.”

At night, Elder found it difficult to go out without causing a fuss.

“Paine College prepared our food for us each night,” he said. “It kept us from trying to get into the restaurants. At that time of year everyone was so busy, I felt that would be the best thing.”

MASTERS OFFICIALS paired Elder with veteran Gene Littler, a former U.S. Open champion and one of the friendliest players on tour.

“It was nice that they chose for him to play with me,” Littler said.

The pairing suited Elder.

“I tell you I couldn’t have picked a better person to play with,” Elder said. “He held his hand up for people to stop talking. It was a situation I really enjoyed.”

The two went off at 11:15 a.m., and Elder got off to a fine start with a par and a birdie in his first two holes. But it didn’t last, and he finished the round at 2-over-par 74.

“A 74 is a good round here,” Elder said after the round. “It could have been higher, but I got up and down a few times to save some good pars. I thought I drove the ball well, but my iron play wasn’t so good.”

Elder said the Augusta galleries treated him well.

“Fantastic,” he said. “Every green I walked up on it was a standing ovation when I arrived.”

In the second round, Elder had an early afternoon tee time alongside another veteran player, Miller Barber.

Elder struggled early in the round, shooting 4-over 40 on the front, and could not make any birdies coming home in his round of 78.

“I was too relaxed,” Elder told reporters. “I thought I could do anything and get close to par. I wish I had felt some pressure. Everything I did was incorrect.”

With a 36-hole total of 152, Elder missed the cut by four shots.

“I’ve missed cuts before and I will miss them again,” Elder said.

The weekend featured one of the most thrilling shootouts in Masters history. Nicklaus had held the lead at the midway point, but faltered on Saturday and opened the door for Weiskopf and Miller to get back into contention.

Sunday’s final round was a memorable one as the three golfers matched birdies before Nicklaus settled matters with a dramatic 40-foot birdie at the 16th hole.

LEE ELDER’S MASTERS story didn’t end with 1975.

He didn’t qualify for the 1976 Masters, but he made it to Augusta five more times from 1977 to 1981. He made the cut three times, and his best showing was a tie for 17th in 1979.

He went on to win three more times on the PGA Tour and, when he turned 50, he began playing on the Senior Tour. He won eight times on that circuit.

Black golfers Calvin Peete and Jim Thorpe followed in Elder’s footsteps by qualifying for the Masters. But they, too, struggled to find success at Augusta National.

In the mid-1990s, a promising young golfer from California made his Masters debut as an amateur. In 1997, Tiger Woods shattered barriers and scoring records as he became the first black player to win a major. That it happened at the Masters made it all the more special.

Elder drove up for the final round in 1997 to see Woods, and even got a speeding ticket along the way.

“He didn’t pay for it, either,” Elder said with a laugh. “But it was a good thing for me to see him win and make history there.”

Now, two decades later, Elder is disappointed that no other blacks have qualified to play in the Masters since Woods.

“You have to realize no one is going to give you anything,” he said. “You have to work for it. If you want to make some strides, you have got to really get down and dig and work at it and do the best you can possibly do to try to accomplish those type of things.”

Elder wishes he had been a younger man when he first qualified for Augusta. A decade earlier and he might even have contended, he said. But he has no regrets.

“I’ve made so many good friends in Augusta,” he said. “I really enjoy going back there.”