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An engineer for General Electric (he helped design the "rabbit ear" antenna on GE's first portable TV), Solheim took up golf at age 42. He was frustrated with his clubs, so he turned his engineering skills to improving their design. He started Karsten Manufacturing in his garage, making a model out of popsicle sticks and sugar cubes. The resulting iron made such a distinctive "ping" when it hit the ball he named his club line "Ping", and the Ping clubs have been best-sellers since. He also sponsored women's golf tournaments to support women in the game. Solheim died February 16 in Phoenix from Parkinson's disease. He was 88. From This is True for 13 February 2000 Suggestions for further reading:
 By: Geoff Shackelford List Price: $45.00 Amazon Price: $29.25 Editorial Review: What is so immediately stunning about this visual biography of one of golf's great physical masterpieces is the photography itself: it's all archival, and it's all black and white. It lends Alister MacKenzie's Cypress Point Club a deeply personal feeling. It seems to carry with it a sense of past, permanence, and inherent artistry, as if it were a valued family heirloom. In a sense, this volume is the family album of a cherished golf course, the photographic and historical record of the people who brought the course to life--including MacKenzie, the titular designer who would later coax Augusta National from the landscape, and Marion Hollins, one of the most formidable women ever to master a mashie--and how they collaborated to accomplish their ideal. Though overshadowed by Pebble Beach, its more famous Monterey Peninsula neighbor, Cypress Point remains one of the true crown jewels in American golf. Its pedigree is second to none, and its 16th hole--a long par 3 over the ocean--is generally acclaimed as the premier one-shotter in existence. Shackelford, a prolific historian of golf course architecture and designers, spends the first third of the volume affectionately introducing us to Cypress Point's founders, its planners, the ideas that went into creating the club, and the work that went into building the course. Then he takes us through Cypress Point hole by hole, with his own informative text augmented by theoretical and site-specific insights from MacKenzie and his assistant, Robert Hunter, all gift-wrapped with stunningly dramatic photos from the 1920s and '30s. Alister MacKenzie's Cypress Point Club is a truly lovely volume, historically fascinating and visually pleasing. To the golf-obsessed among us, the surprising story behind the birth of No. 16 should alone be worth the greens fees. But like No. 16 itself, the story is just part of an overall whole, and there's much in Cypress Point to beguile anyone who can appreciate the splendid connection between an ancient game and an environment that gorgeously elevates it. --Jeff SilvermanThroughout the world, few golf courses are as revered as California’s Cypress Point Club — not just for its breath-taking beauty but for its architectural significance. Located on the Monterey Peninsula along the white sands and steep cliffs that border the Pacific Ocean, the beauty of Cypress Point is the equal of its more famous neighbor Pebble Beach. Unlike Pebble, however, the history of Cypress Point has been relatively unknown. That is, until now. Alister MacKenzie’s Cypress Point Club, by Geoff Shackelford, is a biography of both the creation and the creator of this legendary and elusive layout. Typical of Shackelford’s work, the book is richly detailed and painstakingly assembled. Remarkable vintage photographs and insightful text not only take you back to the 1920s, they take you through the mental and physical process that went into developing each and every hole — including the spectacular 16th, arguably the most famous hole in the world.  By: David Owen List Price: $16.00 Amazon Price: $10.88 Editorial Review: Analyzing the legend and lore of golf's most celebrated tournament has become something of a cottage industry of late, but Owen, who displayed his personal golfing affections, frustrations, and obsessions so marvelously in My Usual Game, now goes where his competition hasn't gained access: to the source--via access to Augusta National's archives, records, and membership. The result is a sympathetic, yet still critical and complex portrait of the club and its founder, Clifford Roberts, to whom golf history has not been particularly kind. Indeed, for better--and for worse--Roberts and Augusta remain linked throughout what is essentially a volume that weaves biography with social history played against a sporting canvas. Naturally, finance, ego, Bobby Jones, television, and President Eisenhower figure into the tale, but Eisenhower's not the only leader of the free world to use the club's exclusivity to his benefit; Owen uncovers the delicious bit that Ronald Reagan and George Schultz helped finalize the invasion of Grenada there. Of course, there is also some great golf. Augusta National would be just another golf club with a fancy pedigree and history of exclusion were it not for the remarkable tournament that it hosts every year. Owen, a graceful writer, tees up plenty of detail and anecdote in a hole-by-hole tour of the track, lined with perspective. Owen explains, If the Masters seems older than it is, that's largely because the tournament, alone among the majors, is conducted year after year on the same course. Every important shot is played against a backdrop that consists of every other important shot, all the way back to 1934. Every key drive, approach, chip, and putt is footnoted and cross-referenced across decades of championship play. Every swing--good or bad--has a context. The context that Owen provides makes The Making of the Masters as indispensable as a hot putter. --Jeff SilvermanThe Masters. For any golf fan, the words evoke the immortal greats of the game and their quest for the most prized trophy of all -- the green jacket of Augusta National Golf Club. But behind the legendary links and timeless traditions is one of the most overlooked and misunderstood figures in the history of the Masters and Augusta National: Clifford Roberts, the club's chairman from its founding in 1931 until shortly before his death in 1977. Roberts' meticulous attention to detail, his firm authoritarian hand, and his refusal to settle -- even for perfection -- helped build the Masters into the tournament it is today, and Augusta National into every golfer's idea of heaven on earth. David Owen was granted unprecedented access to the archives and records of Augusta National Golf Club. He has produced an honest and affectionate chronicle of the Masters, from its conception to its modern greatness, and a fascinating portrayal of Clifford Roberts -- whose perseverance and pride forged the Augusta National we know today.  By: Steve Eubanks List Price: $19.00 Amazon Price: $19.00 Editorial Review: When Augusta was first published in 1997, Steve Eubanks was summarily fired from his job as a club professional in Alabama. Given golf's tight fraternity, it's no surprise. With skillful and thorough reportage, he was the first to throw open, with detail, the dark corners of Augusta National's musty, humorless, arrogant closets. Augusta, updated to include Tiger Woods's masterful defeat of the course in 1997, chronicles the story of a private enclave of power, privilege, and prejudice that still seems to operate under the tight fist of co-founder Clifford Roberts more than 20 years after his suicide. Even so, the great tournament held on its grounds--the Masters--remains a true jewel in the international sporting crown. Eubanks is not afraid to juggle the apparent contradiction of cause and effect; in fact, it is his willingness to do just that that keeps Augusta several strokes under par.Founded in 1933, the Augusta National Golf Club is the perfect course. Co-designed by legends Bobby Jones and Alister MacKenzie, Augusta boasts gorgeous fairways and perfectly manicured greens, set against a breathtaking backdrop of azaleas and pines. Every April, the invitation-only Masters Tournament is watched by millions of avid viewers around the globe. But the exclusive club, with a membership comprising some of the world's most powerful and influential men, is also notorious for a legacy of secrets and controversy. Journalist and novelist Steve Eubanks used all of his investigative and storytelling talents to get to the heart of Augusta's turbulent history, including its 44-year rule under the iron fist of Cliff Roberts and his suicide on the club's grounds; the Masters' impetuous yet long-standing relationship with CBS; allegations of racism; and the club's countless, rigid rules (members can even be expelled for wearing their green Augusta blazers outside the club). With 45 inspiring photographs, Eubanks's balanced account also captures the historic moments that evoke deep affection for Augusta, from Dwight Eisenhower teeing off in the days before the Masters was televised to Jack Nicklaus's emotional victory at age 46, 23 years after he won his first green jacket. With a new chapter on Tiger Woods's 1997 triumph and published just in time for the 1998 Masters, Augusta is essential reading for anyone who wants the complete story of American golf's most hallowed ground.  By: Alister MacKenzie List Price: $29.95 Amazon Price: $22.76 Editorial Review: In 1933 Alister MacKenzie put on paper his considerable golfing knowledge. One of the game's most revered course designers--he conceived Augusta National, site of the Masters, and served the hallowed links of St. Andrews for years as consulting architect--MacKenzie synthesized his thoughts on golf's history, its equipment, its personalities, and his musings on what makes a great course and what makes a great hole, into a manuscript that lay hidden for more than 60 years. Finally available, it stands as one of the most courtly and cultivated treatises ever written on the royal and ancient game. His concepts of the psychology of design are as apt today as when he penned them, and his anecdotal spinnings on his own golfing trials should inspire anyone who's thought of picking up a club.There’s no question that Dr. Alister MacKenzie was one of the best golf course architects in the history of the game. Augusta National, Royal Melbourne, Cypress Point—among many other famous layouts—are proof of that fact. In the mid-1990s, MacKenzie’s lost golf manuscript, written a year before his death in 1933, was found and finally published as The Spirit of St. Andrews. Even all these years later, MacKenzie’s thoughts on such topics as the golf swing, rules, great courses and holes, and golfers are interesting and intuitive.  List Price: $18.95 Amazon Price: $18.95 |
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