Bobby Jones

Robert Tyre Jones Jr., born in Atlanta on March 17, 1902, and dying on December 18, 1971, was an American amateur golfer and lawyer who profoundly shaped the sport. He founded and helped design Augusta National Golf Club and co-founded the Masters Tournament, whose innovations were later adopted by nearly every professional golf tournament worldwide. Jones was the most accomplished amateur golfer in national and international competition. Between 1923 and 1930, he dominated top amateur events and regularly beat leading professionals like Walter Hagen and Gene Sarazen.

He earned his living as a lawyer, playing golf only as an amateur, mostly part-time, and retired from competition at 28, though he later earned money as an instructor and equipment designer. Explaining his retirement, Jones said championship golf was “like a cage” you are expected to enter and stay in, but “nobody can stay there.” He is best known for his 1930 Grand Slam: winning all four major tournaments of his era—the U.S. and British Opens and the U.S. and British Amateurs—in a single year. In 31 majors, he won 13 and finished in the top ten 27 times.

After retiring in 1930, Jones founded and helped design Augusta National in 1933 and co-founded the Masters, held annually since 1934 (except 1943–45 due to World War II), which became one of golf’s four majors. He played in the Masters on an exhibition basis from 1934 to 1948. His final round of golf was at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta on August 18, 1948; a commemorative picture hangs in the clubhouse. Citing health problems, he quit golf permanently. Jones suffered from syringomyelia, a rare neurological condition that eventually left him unable to walk, and died of cardiovascular disease in 1971. He was often confused with golf course designer Robert Trent Jones, with whom he occasionally worked. To avoid confusion, the golfer was called “Bobby” and the designer “Trent.”

Jones was born in Atlanta on March 17, 1902. As a frail child, golf was prescribed to strengthen him. Encouraged by his father, an Atlanta lawyer, he loved the game and won his first children’s tournament at age six at East Lake Golf Club. In 1916, at 14, he won the inaugural Georgia Amateur Championship, putting him in the national spotlight.

That win earned him an invitation to the U.S. Amateur at Merion, where he reached the quarterfinals. He was influenced by club professional Stewart Maiden, who also trained three-time U.S. Women’s Amateur winner Alexa Stirling. Jones also took lessons from Willie Ogg as a teenager. He often played with his skilled father and initially struggled with his temper, but learned to control it.

During World War I (1917–1918), he toured the U.S. playing exhibition matches with Stirling and Perry Adair for war relief, which prepared him for national competition. He first represented the U.S. in winning international amateur matches against Canada in 1919 and 1920, earning three of four possible points. In 1919, he traveled to Hamilton, Ontario, for his first serious competition outside the U.S., and tied for second in the Canadian Open, 16 shots behind winner J. Douglas Edgar.

Edgar, who immigrated from England in 1919 to work at Druid Hills Golf Club in Atlanta, mentored Jones and helped develop his game. Jones qualified for his first U.S. Open at 18 in 1920, paired with Harry Vardon. He won the Southern Amateur three times (1917, 1920, 1922). He earned a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Georgia Tech in 1922, lettering all four years on the varsity golf team, and was a member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon.