Philadelphia was where televised golf found its future!

“Did You Know”
Philadelphia was where televised golf found its future!

While attending the 1956 PGA of America’s annual meeting, Llanerch Country Club professional Marty Lyons sold the delegates on a proposal for his club to host the 1958 PGA Championship.

In July 1957 Lyons and several Llanerch members took a trip to Dayton, Ohio to check out the PGA Championship which was being played at the Miami Valley GC. They were there to learn what they could about hosting a major golf championship.

On returning home, Lyons said he had witnessed the best run championship the PGA had ever held, but it had lost money. The PGA Championship had been played with a match play format for 42 years. Lyons knew there was something missing other than losing money. Lyons decided the tournament would be better if played at stroke play instead of match play.

Lyons wrote a letter to the PGA of America laying out his reasons for changing the PGA Championship to match play. The $42,000 in prize was almost $14,000 more than that year’s US Open but some of the best players did not enter. In five days the finalists had to play four 18-hole matches the first two days and then three 36-hole matches the next three days. That was not appealing to some of the more veteran professionals. With stroke play the starting field would be larger. More PGA members could play in the tournament and the best players in the world would enter. Four days of stroke play would draw more spectators than match play. The tournament would show a profit and more facilities would be bidding to host the championship. Also, with stroke play television companies might be interested, which could make the tournament profitable.

In the fall of 1957 Lyons was in attendance at the PGA’s national meeting in California where he sold the delegates on changing the PGA Championship to stroke play.

Lyon’s work was just beginning. John Facenda, a Llanerch CC member and later the voice of NFL Films, was the nightly news anchor at Philadelphia’s CBS affiliate WCAU. Lyons talked to Facenda about televising the tournament and Facenda spoke to the executives at CBS. A contract to televise the tournament was worked out.

Working on the nightly newscasts at WCAU were two young men who played golf, Frank Chirkinian and Jack Whitaker. Many days they played golf before reporting for work at WCAU. Chirkinian produced the nightly news telecasts and Whitaker reported on sports.

In 1954 NBC had begun televising the last two holes of the US Open for one hour. CBS began televising the Masters In 1956 with six stationary cameras. CBS could not afford to send more to Augusta, Georgia. CBS televised the last four holes for three days. There was one hour of coverage on Sunday and the three days totaled two and one-half hours. Ten million people tuned in over the three days.

With the PGA Championship being a match play format there was no assurance of who would be playing in the tournament final on Sunday, so the television companies had no interest in paying money for broadcast rights.

Even though CBS had been televising the Masters for three years, 32-year-old Frank Chirkinian was chosen to produce the telecast of the PGA Championship. Whitaker did interviews with the leading players for CBS’ nightly news. The last three holes on Saturday and Sunday, along with the awarding of the Wanamaker trophy to the winner, were televised for a total of two and one-half hours over the two days.

It was great television. Forty-six year-old Sam Snead led with 18 holes to play with Billy Casper one stroke back. On Sunday Snead fell back with a 73. Dow Finsterwald put together a 67 to slip past both Snead and Casper, who was posting an even par 70. Casper finished second and Snead third. That next April Chirkinian was in Augusta, Georgia producing the Masters. For 38 years Chirkinian produced the Masters for CBS. At the same time he directed all of televised sports for CBS. With numerous innovations Chirkinian came to be known as “the father of televised golf”.