HOLLYWOOD HOGAN

Golf's "wee ice mon" DOMINATED IN HIS PRIME, winning anywhere and everywhere. But, true to a Tinseltown script, HIS SUCCESS IN SO-CAL was a THRILLER. Roll camera: Here's Ben in L.A. at his best.

- MICHAEL CORCORAN

DESPITE the many sobriquets assigned him by the press during his peak years as a player, Ben Hogan was a half inch taller than the average U.S. male at the time (five foot eight and a half inches). He was, however, noticeably leaner than most and described variously by newspapermen as “the tiny Texan,” “golf ’s mighty mite,” “little” and “wee.” Owing to the singular intensity with which he pursued the game, he was also said to possess the “eyes and nerve of a professional gambler.” One writer referred to him as “the frigid midget,” and another said he was about “as soft as a hydrant.”

When all was done and said, Ben Hogan would set a still unrivaled standard for ball-striking excellence among golf ’s all-time greats and win nine major championships between 1946 and 1953 (including eight in just 11 starts from ’48 to ’53). At the close of his career, Hogan had won 64 PGA Tour events—and he lit it up in the City of Angels, site of this year’s U.S. Open, like no other place.

Ben Hogan arrived at what is now considered his first official PGA Tour event as a 19-year-old high school dropout. In and around Fort Worth, Texas, he’d earned a reputation as a bit of a stick. In the first week of January 1932, however, he was in the field for the Los Angeles Open, a stop on a loosely organized tour that was considered one of the “big money” events on the “winter circuit.”