Why Arnold Palmer’s personalized letters meant so much to so many

The following story was excerpted with permission from “Arnold Palmer: American Hero,” © 2022 The American Golfer, Inc. You might buy the book here.

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Brandt Snedeker had however a number of hours at residence in Franklin, Tenn., on the day that Arnold Palmer died September of 2016. Snedeker had simply accomplished the Tour Championship in Atlanta and had a fast turnaround earlier than he ventured to Minneapolis to play within the Ryder Cup.

Trying someway, as so many golfers have been, to take up the shock and influence that golf’s one and solely king was gone, Snedeker sat down in his residence examine and commenced to pull out some letters that Palmer had written to him via the years.

There was most likely 15 of them, he stated. As he learn every one, learning them for his or her thoughtfulness and personalization, he was struck by the magnitude of Palmer’s heat, generosity and overflowing kindness.

“I’m there looking at all the stuff that he had sent me, and thinking about the time he spent on me . . . I was a no-name guy when he started writing me letters, and I realize he’s done that for a countless number of people,” Snedeker stated. “It kind of hit me, the time he put into everybody else but himself. That’s going to be something you can’t replace.”

When Snedeker made the U.S. Palmer Cup crew after ending his profession at Vanderbilt in 2003, Palmer mailed a letter to him. A 12 months earlier, when Snedeker was named an NCAA Div. 1 All-American, Palmer had mailed him a word and an image, signing it “Best Wishes, Arnold Palmer.”

“It’s pretty cool to have all that stuff at home and go through it and realize that I’m one of probably 10,000 people that he did that for in his life. That’s pretty special.”

Ten thousand? Snedeker’s estimate may very well be excessive.

Truthfully, perhaps it isn’t. Palmer certain made quite a lot of golfers pleased.

When did all of it begin? His longtime assistant and workplace confidante, Doc Giffin, stated Palmer, an old-school gentleman for whom he labored 51 years, wrote letters to match winners

for so long as he can bear in mind.

Giffin was a newspaper man from Pittsburgh, in Palmer’s yard, who first went to work for the PGA Tour and later grew to become Palmer’s private assistant in 1966. The two had fairly a run collectively. Palmer received 62 instances on the PGA Tour. He knew profitable wherever, on any tour, was a particular accomplishment in a profession. Many Monday mornings within the workplace throughout the road from Palmer’s beloved Latrobe Country Club have been saved for discussions between Palmer and Giffin on what had gone on throughout tournaments on a number of excursions over the weekend, similar to who’d received, and the way they’d earned victory.

What had began a long time in the past as Palmer writing handwritten congratulatory notes to winners and pals morphed right into a extra expansive custom in later years. Palmer would dictate personalized letters for winners every week on the PGA Tour, PGA Tour Champions, LPGA and even what’s now known as the Korn Ferry Tour. The letters can be typed up neatly, and Palmer would then affix his well-known signature to them.

“We enjoyed talking about the weekend golf activities, for sure,” Giffin stated. “And I gather that it meant something to the players who got those letters. He did over the years get a lot of ‘thank you’ notes from those who received a letter and appreciated it.”

In Gee Chun profitable a serious on the LPGA? A letter from Palmer. Mark O’Meara starring within the 1996 Presidents Cup with Palmer serving as his captain? A letter.

Wesley Bryan profitable a 3rd title on the Korn Ferry Tour in 2016, incomes a battlefield promotion to the PGA Tour? Palmer despatched him a letter. His letters weren’t solely for winners, both. If a participant did one thing particular, Palmer took discover.

As much as Palmer received, and he received some massive occasions (his 62 PGA Tour titles included seven main championships), he misplaced some actual heartbreakers, too. So any participant who misplaced a championship on the wire could be a candidate for a comforting message from The King.

“From time to time, when somebody had a disappointment and didn’t win, some unusual circumstance, he would occasionally write to someone sympathetic that he didn’t win the tournament,” Giffin stated.

When then-rising University of Michigan sophomore Nick Carlson made a spirited run on the 2016 U.S. Amateur at Oakland Hills exterior Detroit, advancing all the best way to the semifinals, Palmer, who’d received the 1954 U.S. Amateur champion at close by Country Club of Detroit, acknowledged the accomplishment. The U.S. Amateur at Oakland Hills had been contested a few month earlier than Palmer’s dying, and the letter Carlson would obtain was one of many ultimate ones mailed out from the Palmer Enterprises workplace.

“To get the letter, read it, and get goosebumps reading it, almost kind of in tears, you’re so shocked and humbled that someone like that would take the time to reach out to you,” Carlson stated.

Jordan Spieth figures he obtained shut to 15 letters from Palmer. He retains all of them collectively, and vows to body a number of of his favorites to show in his residence in Texas.

“I think the first one I got was the first John Deere,” Spieth stated of his first Tour win, in 2013. “It was so cool. It’s personalized and signed. But…it wasn’t just this special feeling that this letter was coming to me; it was knowing that he took the time to do that each week, and not even just to winners on our tour that week. It’s awesome.”

Palmer’s impeccably neat letters — with a well-recognized Arnold Palmer, P.O. Box 52, Youngstown, Pa., within the daring header — have been despatched via the U.S. mail, although as soon as Palmer began sending letters to winners on the LPGA, a PDF can be connected into an e mail and despatched. With e mail at our fingertips each day, a letter of any form has turn into a misplaced artwork. Palmer beloved to create, signal and ship them.

“That was just his nature,” Giffin stated.

Palmer and Jack Nicklaus regularly have been characterised as heated rivals on the course, however they grew to become nice pals. Nicklaus stated Palmer took him below his wing as a younger participant and taught him a fantastic deal about what it took to be an expert. It was Palmer who satisfied Nicklaus to write a word to a match sponsor on the finish of an occasion. Nicklaus started writing these notes as a PGA Tour rookie and continued the custom into his days on what was then the PGA Senior Tour.

“It’s a nice touch that Arnold taught me,” Nicklaus stated, “and I appreciated that very much.”

Following Palmer’s lead, Nicklaus sends a handwritten word to the 4 main winners every season, one thing he has completed for greater than 40 years. Did Jack ever obtain a letter from his pal Arnold? He couldn’t bear in mind one, although on the event of profitable his sixth Masters in 1986 at age 46, Nicklaus did obtain a Western Union telegram from Palmer.

Palmer, who was 10 years older than Nicklaus, first congratulated Nicklaus on profitable his 18th main. And ceaselessly the optimist, Palmer concluded with this: “Might you think there’s a chance for a 56-year-old?”

Palmer’s historical past of writing letters dated to his enjoying days, when he’d take the time to thank sponsors after every match he’d play. As for the notes to gamers, on the Arnold Palmer Invitational in 2013, he mentioned how he and Giffin, his assistant, would get collectively on Mondays or Tuesdays, discuss concerning the week’s winners, and ship off a personalized message of congratulations. Palmer even confided that past being a fantastic behavior to proceed, there existed a bit further incentive to correspond with the PGA Tour winners.

“It’s something that reminds them that we have a tournament also,” Palmer stated, “and that we’d like them to show up here (to Bay Hill).”

Many instances, although, there have been no strings. The letters merely served as a gracious gesture to congratulate a participant on a job properly completed. Golf is a lonely sport that doles out much more disappointments than triumphant moments, and profitable isn’t straightforward. People ought to take discover. Palmer all the time did.

English professional Paul Broadhurst sorted via mail he’d obtained in late September 2016 whereas he’d returned residence from the U.S. to the tiny village of Fenny Dreyton, exterior Nuneaton. There

have been the standard payments, and there was one piece of correspondence that instantly caught his consideration.

“It’s funny, actually,” Broadhurst stated, “I thought it might be an invite to the Bay Hill Classic (Arnold Palmer Invitational), that’s what I thought. It had ‘Arnold Palmer’ on the envelope, and I thought to myself, ‘Right, I’ve just won the British Seniors, I’ve just won at Pebble Beach, it may be an invite to play.’ That was my initial reaction.”

Broadhurst, who’d received the PGA Tour Champions’ Nature Valley First Tee Pebble Beach Open 9 days earlier, lastly opened the envelope and obtained a shock that trumped any tourney invite: There was a properly written congratulatory letter signed from Mr. Palmer — obtained two days after Palmer’s dying.

Broadhurst’s particular memento is likely one of the final three letters Palmer mailed from his Pennsylvania workplace. In Gee Chun and Michael Thompson, who on Sept. 18, 2016, received occasions on the LPGA and Web.com Tour, respectively, additionally obtained letters from Palmer dated Sept. 19, lower than every week earlier than his dying. (The PGA Tour was off the week of Sept. 15-18.)

On his residence partitions, Broadhurst has framed pictures of him competing within the Ryder Cup, an image of him enjoying alongside Spanish nice Seve Ballesteros, and a photograph from his newbie days on the British Open, when he was paired with Jack Nicklaus.

Broadhurst regrets that he by no means had the possibility to meet Palmer in particular person; he had his letter framed to occupy a spot of prominence in his residence.

“It’s obviously very special,” Broadhurst stated. “The approach he wrote it, though he was unwell, he was watching the top of the golf, or he wouldn’t have identified how I did play the 18th and the delay we had enjoying that gap.

“I’m going to find a nice space for it on my wall.”

Arnold Palmer: American Hero

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Arnold Palmer: American Hero is the seventh book in The American Golfer’s large coffee table book series (11″ X 14″) on the greatest in the game. In addition to the definitive history of the Ryder Cup, the series includes large lavishly produced coffee table books in this format on: Ben Hogan (2), Bobby Jones, Byron Nelson and Jack Nicklaus.

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