The Match

The Clambake
It never would have happened without Bing Crosby. By definition popular culture lives only in the present, desperately seeking currency and the fickle attentions of youth, without a thought to the past. But the twenty-first century's entertainment empire rests on a handful of original foundations that still stand, and for every one of them Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby helped lay the bricks. Here are the improbable facts:
Bing Crosby sang most of the classic American standards first, popularizing the work of every important composer from Gershwin to Cole Porter, principal inspiration for every big voice that followed him, from Sinatra to Elvis. He delivered more hit records than any artist before or since--sixteen charted songs per year for two and a half decades--and to this day, at over seventeen hundred hours, his silvery baritone remains the most recorded voice in human history. He was the first white singing star to incorporate African-American idioms into his work, and in their collaborative recordings he helped bring artists like Louis Armstrong and the Mills Brothers into the mainstream.
For twelve years during radio's heyday Crosby starred in Kraft Music Hall, the most popular weekly show in history, and turned CBS into a national network. Bing also appeared in seventy-nine movies over a forty-year career, in every genre from musicals to light comedy to serious drama. He performed four songs that won Oscars, won one himself for Best Actor, was the number one box-office star for five years running, and remained a top attraction for over two decades. Alongside partner Bob Hope in their immensely popular Road pictures, and in every other arena he conquered, Bing Crosby embodied the whole idea of "cool" before cool was cool.
In 1937, scaling the peak of his stardom, Bing had another idea. A friendly golf tournament, to help out the lads on the struggling professional tour. A casual event at the start of the year to bridge a gap in the PGA's West Coast winter schedule, and partner the pros with his golf-crazed show business buddies for a thirty-six-hole, better-ball affair. A perfect excuse to throw a nonstop party--a stag weekend at the beach near the racetrack Bing had a financial stake in at Del Mar--and while they were having fun, why not raise a few bucks for charity? Bing took up the game of golf seriously while still a youngster in Spokane, Washington. Once a star, he played it religiously--considering golf a stress reliever and social activity, he organized his film schedule around his tee times--and expertly; Crosby carried a single-digit handicap his entire life, won his club championship at Lakeside Golf Club five times, and qualified for both the U.S. and British Amateur.
On opening day of the first Crosby Amateur-Pro, a monsoon blew in off the Pacific, the round was canceled, but no one missed a beat. Bing tossed some steaks on the grill and sang a few tunes on his own patio, which was just off the back nine. Mixed drinks flowed like the Ganges. Waves of aspiring actresses, unbidden, materialized like woodland nymphs. When the sun came out the following day, a rough-edged, smooth-swinging rookie pro who'd recently emerged from the West Virginia hills named Samuel Jackson Snead stepped up to win both the abbreviated tournament and the Pro-Am, then refused Bing's personal check for $732, preferring to take his prize money in cash, no offense to Mr. Crosby. The twenty-five-year-old Snead explained, in his back country banjo twang, that he didn't put much stock in bank accounts. He was still carrying around the bankroll from his first professional victory in Oakland only two weeks earlier.
Born the same year as Nelson and Hogan, in 1912, the youngest of five brothers from an Appalachian coal mining county, Sam Snead grew up around a swank resort called the Homestead Hotel in Hot Springs, Virginia, where his father worked as a handyman. Without much formal education, the Snead family tree was crowded with musicians, eccentric inventors, and gifted athletes, qualities that all found their way into Sam's supremely natural game. A tall, lanky, and almost freakishly strong physical specimen, he was the most gifted natural athlete to ever seriously pursue golf. Sam excelled at every sport he tried, but grew up caddying and fell in love with the game at the Homestead's home course--an early Donald Ross design--and landed his first job as a professional at the Greenbrier, a rival resort in neighboring West Virginia. He emerged from these mountain retreats a few years later onto golf's national stage, his greatness fully formed, as a kind of prodigal Forrest Gump.