Jack Nicklaus - Amateur and College Golf Career

Amateur and College Golf Career

Nicklaus was born in the Columbus, Ohio suburb of Upper Arlington, Ohio and is of German descent, the son of pharmacist Charlie Nicklaus (who ran several sites named Nicklaus Drug Store) and his wife Helen. Charlie was a skilled all-round athlete, who had played college football for The Ohio State University Buckeyes, and had gone on to play semi-professional football under an assumed name for the Portsmouth Spartans (which later became the NFL's Detroit Lions). Charlie had also been a scratch golfer and local tennis champion in his youth. Jack was raised in Upper Arlington, and attended Upper Arlington High School, whose nickname and mascot are called the Golden Bears. Jack was an honorable mention All-Ohio selection in basketball as a shooting guard his senior year, and received some recruiting interest from college basketball programs, including Ohio State. Jack also competed successfully during his youth in football, baseball, tennis, and track and field.

Jack Nicklaus took up golf at the age of ten, scoring a 51 at Scioto Country Club for his first nine holes ever played. Charlie Nicklaus had joined Scioto that same year, returning to golf to help heal a volleyball injury. Jack was coached at Scioto by club pro Jack Grout, a Texas-developed contemporary of golf greats Byron Nelson and Ben Hogan; Grout had played quite successfully on the PGA Tour, and would become Nicklaus's lifelong golf instructor. Nicklaus overcame a mild case of polio as a 13-year-old.

Nicklaus won the first of five straight Ohio State Junior titles at the age of 12. At 13, he broke 70 at Scioto Country Club for the first time, and became that year's youngest qualifier into the U.S. Junior Amateur, where he survived three match-play rounds. He had earned a handicap of +3 at age 13, the lowest in the Columbus area. Nicklaus won the Tri-State High School Championship (Ohio/Kentucky/Indiana) at the age of 14 with a round of 68, and also recorded his first hole-in-one in tournament play the same year. At 15, Nicklaus shot a 66 at Scioto Country Club, which was the amateur course record, and qualified for his first U.S. Amateur. He won the Ohio Open in 1956 at age 16, highlighted by a phenomenal third round of 64, competing against professionals. In all, Nicklaus won 27 events in the Ohio area from age 10 to age 17.

In 1957, Nicklaus won the U.S. National Jaycees Championship, having lost the previous year in a playoff. Nicklaus also competed in his first of 44 consecutive U.S. Opens that year, but missed the cut. In 1958 at age 18, he competed in his first PGA Tour event, the Rubber City Open, at Akron, Ohio, tying for 12th place after being just one out of the lead at the 36-hole mark, and made the cut in the U.S. Open, tying for 41st place. Nicklaus also won two Trans-Mississippi Amateurs – in 1958 at Prairie Dunes Country Club and 1959 at Woodhill Country Club, with final match victories of 9 & 8 and 3 & 2, respectively. Also in 1959, Nicklaus won the North and South Amateur at Pinehurst, North Carolina and competed in three additional PGA Tour events, with his best finish being another 12th place showing at the Buick Open.

While attending Ohio State University, he won the U.S. Amateur twice (1959, 1961), and an NCAA Championship (1961). In the 1959 U.S. Amateur, Nicklaus defeated two-time winner and defending champion Charles Coe in the final 36-hole match 1-up, with a birdie on the final hole. This was significant not only because of Coe's proven ability as a player, but also because Nicklaus became the then-youngest champion in the modern era, second only to Robert A. Gardner, who won in 1909. In 1961, Nicklaus became the first player to win the individual title at the NCAA Championship and the U.S. Amateur in the same year. He was followed by Phil Mickelson (1990), Tiger Woods (1996), and Ryan Moore (2004). Nicklaus also won the NCAA Big Ten Conference Championship that year with a 72-hole aggregate of 283, while earlier claiming the Western Amateur in New Orleans. In his second and last U.S. Amateur win in 1961, Nicklaus convincingly defeated Dudley Wysong 8 & 6 at Pebble Beach in the 36-hole championship match. For the week, Nicklaus was 20 strokes under par, including 34 birdies and two eagles.

At the 1960 U.S. Open, Nicklaus shot a two-under par 282, finishing second by two strokes to Arnold Palmer, who won the tournament with a final round charge of six-under-par 65. This score remains the lowest ever by an amateur in the U.S. Open. Nicklaus played the final 36 holes with Ben Hogan, who later remarked he had just played 36 holes with a kid who should have won by 10 shots. During the final 36 holes, Nicklaus was two-under-par, and never shot a single round above par during the entire tournament, the only entrant to do so. Nicklaus had led by two shots with six holes to play. In 1960, Nicklaus also tied for 13th in the Masters Tournament. He tied for fourth in the 1961 U.S. Open, three shots behind champion Gene Littler, having played the final 54 holes one under par. Each of these three major championship finishes designated Nicklaus as Low Amateur. However, Nicklaus' one-under-par 287 tied for seventh in the 1961 Masters Tournament, and was second that year only to Charles Coe's low amateur placing, when he tied for second with Arnold Palmer at seven-under par 281, one shot behind champion Gary Player.

Nicklaus represented the United States against Great Britain and Ireland on winning Walker Cup teams in both 1959 and 1961, decisively winning both of his matches in each contest. On the 1959 trip to Britain, he also made his only attempt at the British Amateur, the world's oldest international amateur event, at Royal St George's Golf Club, reaching the quarterfinal round (top 8). He was also a member of the victorious 1960 U.S. Eisenhower Trophy team, winning the unofficial individual title by 13 shots over teammate Deane Beman with a four-round score of 269, a record which still stands; this score was 18 shots lower than Ben Hogan's earlier U.S. Open aggregate of 287 at the same site (which had, however, been scored under much tougher conditions). Nicklaus was named the world's top amateur golfer by Golf Digest magazine for three straight years, 1959–1961.