The New Georgia Encyclopedia is supported by funding from A More Perfect Union, a special initiative of the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Professional golfer Larry Nelson has won ten PGA Tour events and nineteen Champions Tour events. In 2000 the Marietta resident was named Senior Player of the Year.
Courtesy of Georgia Golf Hall of Fame
Nancy Lopez competes while a student-athlete at the University of Tulsa in Oklahoma. Lopez enrolled at the university in 1974 on a golf scholarship, and in 1976 she was named an all-American. The following year she left school to begin her professional career.
Courtesy of Tulsa Athletic Media Relations
Nancy Lopez is one of the most successful golfers in the Ladies Professional Golf Association, with career tournament winnings of more than $5 million. Inducted into the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame in 1998, Lopez sponsors charity golf tournaments in Albany and Stockbridge each year.
Courtesy of Georgia Golf Hall of Fame
Tommy Aaron, a native of Gainesville, won the Master's Tournament in Augusta in 1973. He was later inducted into both the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame and the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame.
Courtesy of Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Tommy Aaron became an amateur golf champion during his high school years in the 1950s. After turning professional in 1961, Aaron became one of the Professional Golf Association's top money earners. In 1969 and 1973 he played for the Ryder Cup team.
Courtesy of Special Collections & Archives, Georgia State University Library, Atlanta Journal-Constitution Photographic Archive.
Davis Love III, a professional golfer who makes his home in Sea Island, played for the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill from 1983 to 1985. He was named an all-American three times, as well as an all-Atlantic Coast Conference golfer, during his collegiate career.
Courtesy of UNC Athletic Communications
Davis Love III, a resident of Sea Island, was inducted into the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame in 2001. A professional golfer since 1985, Love was listed in 2004 as the fourth all-time money winner on the Professional Golf Association tour.
Courtesy of Georgia Golf Hall of Fame
On July 8, 1948, Louise Suggs turned professional, and in her inaugural year as a pro she won the 1949 U.S. Open by a record fourteen strokes. Suggs continued to win tournaments and set records throughout her pro career.
Courtesy of Georgia Sports Hall of Fame.
Louise Suggs was one of the charter members of the Ladies Professional Golf Association, and her competitiveness, accuracy, and "picture swing" led her to a phenomenal amateur and professional career in golf.
Courtesy of Georgia Sports Hall of Fame.
Louise Suggs won a number of amateur golf championships between 1941 and 1948 before turning professional in 1948. In 1996 she was the first woman to be inducted into the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame.
Courtesy of Georgia Sports Hall of Fame.
Dot Kirby retired from tournament play in the mid-1950s; in 1974 she was inducted into the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame, and in 1989 she was inducted into the Georgia Golf Hall of Fame.
Courtesy of Georgia Sports Hall of Fame.
In 1933 at the age of thirteen Georgia native Dot Kirby became the youngest female golfer to win a state championship. She was Georgia women's golf champion five times during her career.
Courtesy of Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
In 1974 golfer Dot Kirby was inducted into the Georgia Sports Hall of Fame.
Courtesy of Georgia Sports Hall of Fame.
Three professional golfers and their caddies walk up the eighteenth fairway during a practice round at the 2015 Masters Tournament in Augusta.
Photograph by Shannon McGee
First played in 1934, the Masters Tournament is one of golf's four "major" events, alongside the U.S. Open, the British Open, and the PGA Championship. The tournament is staged every April at the Augusta National Golf Club.
Photograph by Torrey Wiley
At first Bobby Jones resisted the idea of competing in the tournament at the Augusta National Golf Club, but partner Clifford Roberts convinced him that his participation might make the difference between the survival and failure of the tournament. Jones agreed to play.
Photograph from Wikimedia
Professional golfer Tiger Woods tied for seventeenth place in the 2015 Masters Tournament, held each April at Augusta National Golf Club.
Photograph by Shannon McGee
First played in 1934, the Masters Tournament is one of golf's four "major" events, alongside the U.S. Open, the British Open, and the PGA Championship. The tournament is staged every April at the Augusta National Golf Club.
Photograph by pocketwiley
The greatest amateur golfer ever, Bobby Jones dominated his sport in the 1920s. His most outstanding project in retirement was the creation of the Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, and the annual invitational tournament it spawned, the Masters.
Robert Tyre "Bobby" Jones circa 1921. The greatest amateur golfer ever, Jones dominated his sport in the 1920s. In the eight seasons from 1923 to 1930, Jones won thirteen major championships, including five U.S. Amateurs, four U.S. Opens, three British Opens, and one British Amateur. On September 27, 1930 he became the only man to win all four major titles in one season, completing the "Grand Slam" of golf. Then, while still in his athletic prime at the age of twenty-eight, he retired from competition to devote more time to his family and his law practice.
Image from Wikimedia
In 1930 Bobby Jones became the only man to win all four major titles in one season, completing the "Grand Slam" of golf. Considered the greatest amateur ever to play the game, his achievements were commemorated on this 1981 postage stamp.
Courtesy of the Smithsonian National Postal Museum
