Professional tournament golf is a world of huge prize money, lucrative endorsements, Lear jets to exotic locations, and sponsorship. Most of the players went to college, and the best are pals of presidents and among the most admired and envied citizens of our world. But it wasn't always this way. Golf has always had its own patois, and "gettin' to the dance floor" is the old pro's metaphor for arriving at the putting green, that final smooth and uncluttered haven on a road bestrewn with thick forests and tall grass and deep ponds and horrible little sand pits called bunkers. In the early days gettin' to the dance floor stood for much more than that. It meant scraping together enough cash to eat, scrounging a ride to the next tournament in a beat-up car, or finding space in a fleabag hotel, or searching for a better golf swing with nowhere to practice and no time to do it. Most of all, it meant keeping a club job and a family afloat while gypsying around the country for half the year in the middle of a depression. The lifestyle was bone-wrenching and the purses piddling, and it was always a grind, and it certainly wasn't glamorous, and nobody got even within smelling distance of rich. But it was what you had to do if you had it in your blood, and for most of those rugged pioneers it was both a compulsion and a joyful adventure. This book celebrates that time and those die-hard individualists and their rich and rugged experiences in a lovely and unique trip down memory lane. Al Barkow, one of America's most perceptive golf writers, spent more than a year travelling the land talking with some twenty of the leading personalities of that seminal golfing era, then set down what they told him, in their own words. The result is a colourful oral history of both some remarkable people and the gestation perios of what eventually grew into today's billion-dollar industry.

Gettin' to the Dance Floor: The Early Days of American Pro-golf

Sports & Outdoors

AL BARKOW

Biographies

Heinemann

Demonstrates correct golf address, grip, swing, pitches, chips, sand shots, and puts, and explains how to correct for a hook, slice, of difficult lie

The Venturi System: With Special Material on Shotmaking for the Advanced Golfer

Ken Venturi

Coaching

Atheneum

Twentieth Century Golf Chronicle

Diane Pub Co.

No game is quite like golf. For starters, no game lends itself to both deep philosophical thinking and hilarious one-liners the way golf does. And whether you have five minutes or five hours to spend, The Wit and Wisdom of Golf can fill it with entertainment. Compiled and written by three highly respected golf writers, The Wit and Wisdom of Golf is 168 pages of insightful thinking on the grand old game. Nine chapters cover every bounce, lie and angle. Here is a sampling of the chapters:
<ul>
<li>The Joys of Golf. Stories and quips that get at the essence of the game, like George Low's bon mot, "Give me a millionaire with a fast backswing and I can have a very enjoyable afternoon."</li>
<li>The Players. Curious and mirthful stories, such as how the great woman golfer Mickey Wright got a D in golf at Stanford, and how George Archer said he wasn't sure if he qualified for the Senior Tour because "my knee's only a few months old, my back's 17 years old and I recently got a new hip. I might be too young." </li>
<li>Courses, the Mental Game and Professional Advice. Including Gene Sarazen's suggestion that the worst thing a player can do when practicing is set the ball up in a perfect lie each time.</li>
</ul>
The Wit and Wisdom of Golf is a beautifully illustrated and easy-to-read stroll through nearly a thousand of the smartest and funniest things ever said about the game of golf. For you or the avid golfer on your gift list, The Wit and Wisdom of Golf is like a perfect lie and a clear shot to the pin.

Shaped Wit and Wisdom Golf

david-barrett

Ken Janke

Publications International

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Books by AL BARKOW