Each year, the pro-ams played before, and sometimes during, the various Tour events raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for charity. Undoubtedly, the most famous performer connected with a tournament is Bob Hope, whose Desert Classic has raised over 5 million dollars through the years. Some 70 percent of this money has been distributed to The Eisenhower Memorial National Center. But the star of this event is still Bob Hope.
At 76, Hope is a living American institution. As a performer, he has made absolutely no concessions to age. If money doesn't motivate him anymore, audiences still do. And few entertainers of any age are more active. Ten years older than Sam Snead, Hope's passion for golf is also totally undiminished. After taping a TV special recently before an audience of Harvard University students, Hope unwound in his hotel room and reflected on his 50 years as a golfer.
How active is your role in the Bob Hope Desert Classic?
I'm just a front man. The organizers do the work. I take a couple of tables, play some golf with Gerald Ford and appear on television. But I'm proud to be associated with a tournament that raised $900,000 for 40 charities last year and $845,000 the year before that. We get 400 amateurs who shell out $2,500 each and there is a waiting list. I was playing a lot of golf around Palm Springs and the fellows there decided they wanted a tournament and asked me to help find them a sponsor. I asked the Chrysler people if they might be interested, and they replied that they would be under one condition: That I became involved. So here I am.
How much golf do you play today?
If I'm not traveling, I play anywhere from 36 to 90 holes a week. The first tee at the Lakeside Country Club is only three minutes from my home in North Hollywood. And I log all the time I can at Palm Springs. If I can't get out for nine holes, I'll try to squeeze in a bucket of balls. Even when I'm working at the NBC Studios in Burbank, I'll slip out to the driving range next door. And, of course, I play 16 or 17 pro-ams a year.
Do you play as well as you used to play?
I don't do anything as well as I used to. Today my handicap is 15. In 1951, when I was at my golfing peak, it was four. In those days Ben Hogan tutored me. He was the pro at Tamarisk and we played together regularly. He took the kinks out of my swing and got me to make a full turn at the ball.
Who are the best of the Hollywood golfers?
Gordon McRae and Dean Martin are both strong player capable of scores in the high 70s. Of course, if Dean wins anything you have to tell him. Danny Thomas might be good if he didn't carry those stained—glass windows around with him. Sammy Davis, Jr., hits the ball 90 yards and his jewelry goes 110. Once we lost him in a ballwasher. And Jimmy Stewart is so slow he starts in my tournament and finishes with Andy Williams'.
What kind of stakes do you normally play for?
A $10 or $20 Nassau is my idea of fun, but I have gone higher. Before we finally teed up together, Jackie Gleason and I sat around needling each other at Toots Shor's for 10 years. When we went head-to-head at Muirfield, Hack Nicklaus's course, we started at $100 a hole. I was playing well, and Gleason kept on upping the stakes. By the time we reached the 13th, $1,000 was riding on that one hole. Jackie hit a couple of good shots. I put my ball in the water and then into the sand so deep I looked like Omar Sharif. I got it up and down in two, Jackie three-putted, and I wound up winning a bundle. As Jackie was paying off, I told him: "Now you take good care of yourself, I want you to stay healthy." Boy was he frosted!
Who was the best golfer among the famous persons you've played with?
King Baudouin of Belgium. His handicap was three. I was introduced to him at a party at the home of Mervyn Leroy, the producer. Eisenhower was in the White House then. If the King had stopped off in Washington on the way home and played for high stakes with Ike, we'd be paying taxes to Brussels today. He was that good. I went overseas afterwards and we played together against two top-tanked Belgian players. At one point, I took a sloppy seven on a par-5. The King turned to me and remarked dryly, "You must have a lot of money, Mr. Hope."
I told him I didn't even own a country.
How would you rate the U.S. Presidents with whom you've played?
Without a doubt, Gerald Ford is the best. He's a powerful golfer who can hit the ball 250 yards-in any direction. You carry his clubs and it's like Ranger training; his caddies wear green berets. President Kennedy would have been a supurb golfer if he had given more time to the game. The first time I played golf with Kennedy was after an Army-Navy game, which I had watched on television. I noted that JFK—on a raw, gray day in Philadelphia—sat in the stands with no outer garment. Now at Palm Beach, we had finished our match, won by Kennedy. He asked me, "How much do you owe me?"
I removed some money from my pocket and I said to the President, "I saw you at the Army-Navy game. Take enough to buy yourself an overcoat."
Nixon would probably be a 14-handicapper. He scrunches up his body when he gets over the ball and doesn't finish with his hands high enough. But you don't tell a president how he should swing.
Eisenhower? No one got as much pleasure as he did out of a fine shot or breaking 90. Before taking his stance he would sometimes lift his arms in supplication and look skyward, beseeching: "God give me strength to hit it easy."
And Ike played like a general. Every time he stoked a putt, he snapped to attention and barked, "Fall in!"
Ike really hated to lose. I remember once I was playing with the President against Stuart Symington and Gen. Omar Bradley at Burning Tree outside of Washington. I played pretty lousy. We lost our shirts.
The next day, I teamed with Arthur Vadenburg, the Republic senator, against Bradley and the President. I shot about a 75 and we won. I will never forget how sour Ike was when he reached in his pocket and pulled out $3 to pay off.
He looked at me and said, "Why didn't you play like that yesterday when you were on my side?"
During Ike's incumbency, it was my practice to keep him abreast of all the latest golf jokes. When he was stricken with a heart attack and lay at Walter Reed Hospital, I visited him and told the story of two guys getting ready to tee off. A funeral procession passed on the road outside the course and one of the golfers stood erect and place his cap over his hear. The other said, "That was a very reverent gesture." The first answered, "Yes, and come Thursday, we would have been married 20 years." Ike said that was the funniest golf story I ever told him. He died a short while later.
Actually, playing with Presidents is very good for your manners, too. You keep finding yourself saying, "Oh, that one's good, Mr. President. You can pick it up."
Did your on-stage rivalry with Bing Crosby carry serious undertones on the golf course?
No, because there was never any doubt who the better player was. Bing gave me two shots a side. He was club champion at Lakeside three times and much the better player. What made him good? Practice. When we were making the Road Pictures for Paramount, the Wilshire Country Club was only 10 or 12 minutes away from the lot. Bing would hit a bucket of balls at 6 a.m. before he came to the studio. If we cut any length of time, he'd run over again and beat more balls while I'd go across the street to Lucy's Restaurant, sit on a stool and talk to the help and the customers. In those days, Bing and I lived together and played a lot of golf together. Afterwards he moved to get away from the Hollywood scene. In the last 10 years of his life, I didn't see much of him.
What was your best round?
In Calcutta at White Sulphur Springs in 1952 I shot a 71. Shelly Mayfield was paired with me and I was driving the ball with him. Hogan was there, too, and afterwards in the clubhouse he told me: "You should be ashamed of yourself for taking money like that."
What was your career best shot?
I've made five holes-in-one and it's probably somewhere in there. The last one was at Butler National outside Chicago in 1974. George Fazio, who designed the course, was playing with me that day. I knocked a driver on the fifth hole which was playing about 200 yards. When I got my first one 33 years earlier at Lakeside, Joe Louis and Jimmy McLarnin were in my foursome. I hit a 7 iron on the sixth hole, about 125 yards. I remember Joe's exact words. "Man," he said, "that went in the hole."
What are the best aspects of your play today—and the worst?
The fairway woods are probably the strongest part of my game. I seem to stay down on them a little longer and make good contact with the ball. The worst? Chipping and putting. To putt, I use an unorthodox grip. I overlap my left hand with the last three fingers on my right hand. At one time I used to have a communion with the grass. Those blades would talk to me and I'd talk back. I could practically guarantee you anything within six feet. Not any more. But I'm working on it.
Are your clubs a standard set?
Toney Penna makes my burglar's tools and has for the last 30 years. The shaft flex is regular and the swingweight is D-2. In place of the 2-iron and 3-iron, which are too difficult to hit when you are not chemically pure, I carry a 5-wood and 6-wood. I also have at least 150 putters. Everywhere I go, people give me putters. I try them all.
Who was the best golfer you ever saw?
Singling one out is, of course, difficult. But I would have to say that no one I saw struck the ball better than Byron Nelson.
Another great one was Bobby Jones. I knew him from the Christmas show in 1942 when he was in the Navy. But I didn't get to play with him until 1950. He hit the first ball over the fence, out of bounds. He dropped another ball and shot a 69. I have never seen a more perfect or Xeroxed swing. I think he was made by Xerox. Every swing was right in the groove.
Does your wife resent your preoccupation with golf?
Not in any way. In fact, she encourages me to play. That way she knows where I am and what I'm doing. At one time, Dolores was a 5-handicapper, herself. She played for the women's championship at Lakeside five times, but never won it. In 1956 in Vienna, we were invited together to a golf course inside a racetrack. I remember the announcer intoning afterwards: "Scores, Mr. Hope 79, Mrs. Hope 78."
Do you recall your introduction to golf?
I first tried to play in 1923 at Highland Park in Cleveland. Two foursomes passed me while I stood in the same spot trying to advance the ball. I gave it up as too frustrating. Then in 1929, when I was playing the Orpheum vaudeville circuit, I had the mornings free and I was hanging around the hotel. A comedy tumbling act called the Diamond Brothers—one of the brothers, Red, is a bartender in Hackensack today—used to come into the lobby lugging their clubs and talking excitedly about the round they just had played. It stimulated my interest again and I started going out with them. I was hooked.
What appeal does golf hold for you now?
It's still a battle against yourself. It's also a diversion and exercise for me. I just feel better after I play. It's done an awful lot for my health.
I would play tennis if I didn't have to jump over the net when I won.
Do you have any favorite course?
Cypress Point, Merion, Pine Valley and Deepdale on Long Island, where I have a membership, are the course I enjoy the most.
Who are your old golfing cronies?
Everywhere I go now I have golf pals. I couldn't single any of them out or list them. They are all special guys. Going back some years, I liked to play with Joe Louis. I boxed a little, too, you know. Once I recall playing with Joe and Ed Sullivan. Ed was trying to sweet talk Joe into appearing on the Toast of the Town TV show and Joe knew it. On the first hole, Ed conceded a four-foot putt to Joe. The next hole, Louis had a five-footer to make and Ed told him: "That's good, Joe." On the third hole, Joe had a six-footer. Ed again told him: "That's close enough." By then I had had enough. "No it isn't," I snapped. "You putt that one out." Joe doubled up with laughter. Then he canned it.
