Horton Smith was an American professional golfer. As the first businesslike president of PGA, he helped to liberalize PGA policy with respect to black players, did much to place the organization's affairs on a solid footing.
Background
He was born on May 22, 1908 in Springfield, Missouri, United States, the son of Perry H. Smith and Anna Kershner. His father was a successful lawyer-businessman with real estate interests. In 1920 the family purchased a farm near the Springfield Country Club, where Perry Smith was a member and his son annually vied for the junior championship of the club.
Education
Smith attended Missouri State Teachers College at Springfield from 1925 to 1927-he was one of the few professional golfers of this period who had gone to college. But his love of golf led to his decision, apparently against his father's wishes, to leave college and turn professional.
Career
He became club pro at the Joplin (Mo. ) Country Club in 1927. The following year Smith began his meteoric rise to international recognition. Between November 1928 and December 1929, he won eleven tournaments - the record for a first-year professional - including the French Open. In six other competitions he finished second. This string of victories earned him a spot on the U. S. Ryder Cup team, on which he played for a decade. He continued to do well on the winter circuit of 1929-1930, earning a record $15, 500.
The following year, though, he broke his wrist in an accident. This injury began a slump that lasted until 1934. During this period his interests began to turn toward the organizational aspects of the professional golf tour. He served in 1933 as chairman of the tournament committee of the Professional Golfers' Association (PGA). In this capacity he unsuccessfully recommended that the tournament bureau manager, not the players, be given responsibility for enforcing PGA rules.
Smith returned to his earlier form in 1934, when he won the first Masters Tournament at Augusta, Ga. He repeated as Masters champion in 1936, and continued to win tournaments for the rest of the decade. Although he never captured a major championship after 1936, he was twice the leading money winner on the PGA tour. This record was remarkable because Smith's interest and activity were increasingly drawn to tournament business and promotion. He organized players to give speeches in cities where championships were held. He personally wrote to sponsors, thanking them for their support. He also toured for the Spalding sporting goods company after 1935, when he yielded his position as pro at Oak Park Country Club, near Chicago, to his brother Renshaw.
During World War II, Smith served in Europe as a captain in the Army Air Corps. He apparently saw no action. In 1946 he became pro at the Detroit Golf Club, a position he held until his death. He occasionally entered tournaments, his final victory coming in the Michigan PGA Championship of 1948. Until his death he played annually in the Masters, and was proud that he was the only player from the first field to compete in that event into the 1960's.
Smith's interests after the war lay in the business aspects of the PGA. He served as its president from 1951 to 1953.
He died at Detroit.
Achievements
Views
He resisted efforts to exploit television. His view was that regular coverage of tournaments was too costly, too difficult to schedule, and there was no way to dramatize them effectively.
Personality
Despite his achievements Smith remained soft-spoken and unexcitable. His commitment to golf was complete. He gained the reputation of a genial but reserved man who drank only milk.
Quotes from others about the person
He became an idol of American sports fans who saw him as a "farm boy who epitomized the more wholesome aspects of American society. "
Connections
On October 9, 1938, Smith married Barbara Louise Bourne; they had one son. Her father, Alfred S. Bourne, was a member of the August National Golf Club. The separation generated by Smith's career and the war led to estrangement, and they were divorced in 1945.