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OKC Gains Thunder, World Loses Bolt
Published: 9/5/2008 12:31 AM
Last Modified: 9/5/2008 12:31 AM

In April of 2007, I was fired up for two reasons:
1, I was on the way to the Masters for the first time.
2, And, on the way back, I was going to detour through Cherokee Village, Ark., to interview Tommy Bolt, one of the most colorful sports figures in Oklahoma's history (he was born in Haworth).
Bolt seemed like a great old guy, never showing even a hint of his famous temper when we talked in his home the day after Zach Johnson won the Masters.
There's a famous poem titled "To An Athlete Dying Young" that illustrates the tragedy of life lost too soon. But it's also tragic when we lose an athlete far removed from youth and I felt sadness when co-worker Barry Lewis informed me Wednesday that Bolt, 92, had died. Coincidentally, Oklahoma City gained a Thunder (it's the name of the new NBA team) on the same day the the world lost Bolt.

This is the Bolt story the Tulsa World published last year following my trip to his home:

CHEROKEE VILLAGE, Ark. -- Way back in the late 1950s, when Tommy Bolt wasn't far removed from his 40th birthday, he was supposedly on the verge of being over the hill.

Bolt was weary of constant travel on the pro golf circuit and he wasn't playing particularly well, so he left the rat race and started hanging out with a Rat Packer. He took a cushy job at a Sherman Oaks, Calif., course that was frequented by celebrities like Dean Martin, Vic Damone and the bubbly folks from the Lawrence Welk Show.

But, back to the subject: Bolt? Over the hill? It was one of the biggest false alarms in golf history.

Bolt, infamous for club-throwing temper tantrums, returned to the Tour with a peaceful vengeance following his short-lived retirement and secured his greatest victory in 1958, winning the U.S. Open at Southern Hills Country Club.

Nearly a half-century later, the 91-year-old Bolt is fit (he said he eats right and drinks lots of ginger ale) and sharp as a dagger. He reflected on his career during an interview at his Arkansas residence and indicated that he's going to try never to be over the hill.

Different Breed

The current PGA Tour roster is full of cookie-cutter personalities. Bolt is as different as a bolt from the blue.

Born in Haworth, Okla., Bolt was perhaps 3 years old when his family migrated to Paris, Texas, by way of covered wagon. He said they crossed the Red River on a ferry.

The Bolts later settled in Shreveport, La., and struggled to make ends meet, especially after a little something called the Great Depression. Bolt, whose mother died when he was young, said he missed a lot of meals growing up. Occasionally, he hitchhiked to a sister's house to get a good batch of vittles.

But growing up hard makes you a hard worker, according to Bolt. He put money in his pocket by selling newspapers in the mornings and caddying in the afternoons. Way before rap was in vogue, he was the original 50 Cent.

"Sometimes you would get some of those wealthy guys and caddie for them and they would tip 50 cents," said Bolt, who often lugged two bags so he could double his wages. "Fifty cents, that was tremendous."

Bolt had a life-changing experience when, barely a teenager, he caddied for touring pro Al Espinosa. Bolt saw Espinosa's snazzy clothes and wing tip shoes and decided on the spot that he wanted to be a pro golfer.

Playing golf for money beats manual labor. Bolt left school after the ninth grade because it was time to make a living and he began driving nails with his dad, a carpenter. Bolt then served a tour of duty in the military before joining the "other" tour in his mid-30s.

Asked about having a vastly different background than many contemporary golfers, Bolt said, "I guess you call them lucky. I think they are unlucky. I know about all the hard things they are going to have to learn about."

Anger Management

The Bolt temper apparently runs in the family. He and a brother saved caddie profits when they were kids and invested $15 on a set of wooden-shaft clubs. Big bro botched a shot and got so mad that he started smashing clubs against a tree.

"I wanted to stop him, but he was bigger than me, so I couldn't do a thing about it," Bolt said, fearing a sock in the snout. "All of the golf clubs were around a tree. We got the heads and walked in from there."

Bolt thinks his reputation as a human temper tantrum is overblown. He said he has thrown perhaps five or six clubs in anger. He also once said he never threw a club that didn't deserve it.

One of the most famous tosses came at the 1960 U.S. Open, when he zinged a club into a lake after consecutive approach shots trickled into the drink. Later, he joked that he saw a carp jump out of the lake and he said he was merely trying to "stab" the fish with the thrown club.

Bolt said other golfers, Jackie Burke for instance, have admitted throwing "more clubs than I ever saw." But Bolt did just enough to get tagged with a hothead label and, crazy like a fox, he got a career boost because bad boys (think Dennis Rodman) generate publicity.

Said Bolt's wife, Mary Lou, "There were a lot of lazy sports writers who said 'let's just write about Bolt. Let's just sit around the terrace and have a drink. Let's wait around the 18th green and see what he will do.'"

Bolt usually had something salty to say after a round and he feigned eruptions for people who trailed him in hopes that he would lose his cool. "I had a photographer follow me 18 holes one time and I never will forget," Bolt said. "I felt so sorry for the poor guy because I didn't throw a club for him and I got out there and I said 'Get your camera and come on over here and I will throw a club for you.' "

Golfer Jimmy Demaret had fun at Bolt's expense, saying that Bolt's putter "spent more time in the air than Lindbergh." Bob Hope wrote a joke about Bolt soliciting a caddie for advice on club selection. According to the joke, Bolt balked at the caddie's recommendation. The caddie countered by telling Bolt that it was the only club in the bag that wasn't broken.

Bolt himself threw fuel on the fire. He liked to tell people that you should never break your driver and your putter in the same round. He proudly said he taught Arnold Palmer to throw clubs forward so he didn't have to waste energy backtracking to retrieve them.

Bolt said he never would have won anything if his temper was as bad as it was cracked up to be. "You've got to have those fiery emotions," he said. "In order to be a fighter, a competitor, you have got to be that way. You can't be Billy Graham and win a golf tournament."

Speaking of Graham, Bolt said the evangelist "chased me all over the golf course" during a tournament in Atlanta. "He wanted to put that club-thrower at peace."

Serenity Now

Golf icon Ben Hogan once said about Bolt: "If we could have screwed another head on Tommy's shoulders, he could have been the greatest player who ever played."

Reminded of the quote, Bolt said, "I don't think I would have been any greater than him. I think he was the greatest player that ever lived. He could hit more fairways and greens than any of them."

But Bolt (whose career took off after Hogan prescribed a grip adjustment) sort of did screw another head on his shoulders before winning at Southern Hills in '58.

When Bolt left the Tour to work at the California club, he had plenty of time to practice and get his mind right. He read books by Bishop Sheen and power of positive thinking guru Norman Vincent Peale. Bolt carried a card that said, "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference."

Armed with confidence and temper control, Bolt got on a hot streak when he returned to the Tour. Articles during the 1958 U.S. Open referred to him as "reformed." He had to convince reporters he wasn't kidding about his new outlook on life.

"I was just so free and easy," he said. "I was at peace in life, peace with the world. You can do anything when you are at peace."

Bolt birdied the first hole, looked back toward Southern Hills' clubhouse and said to himself, "Well, I wonder who is going to finish second?"

Bolt was a wire-to-wire champion and the closest thing he had to a blow-up came when he scolded a Tulsa World sports writer who incorrectly printed his age as 49. The writer apologized and called it a typographical error. Bolt balked. That was no damn typo, he said. "It was a perfect 4 and a perfect 9!"

Few writers ever got Bolt's age correct, and it wasn't their fault.

"I had two ages, a stage age and a real age," he said. "I didn't want anybody to know that I was 34 years old when I went on the Tour. Thirty-two sounded better. It sounded younger."

The new and improved Bolt didn't even get flustered during a freak occurrence on the final day of the '58 U.S. Open. An approach shot, according to a published report, sailed into the shirt sleeve of a fan with an upraised arm. The ball dropped down the spectator's shirt and settled near his belt line. Twice dealt $100 fines his previous year on Tour due to misbehavior, Bolt kept his cool, swallowed a bogey, conquered Southern Hills and gave his caddie (never saw him again) $500.

Over the hill? Bolt was in the prime of his career and was playing as well as anyone in the world.

Couldn't happen to a nicer guy? Mary Lou said her husband is such an easy touch that magazine salesmen come by to peddle subscriptions "and he buys them all."

The man once known as Terrible Tommy and Thunder Bolt was asked if he wanted to "look mean" while posing for a photograph in April.

Said Bolt, "I don't have a mean bone in my body."




Reader Comments 3 Total
MIKE (4 years ago)
Great story Jimmie, but where are your words on the OKC Thunder? Or am I confused as to what the title of the blog is actually refering to?
Jimmie Tramel (4 years ago)
Sorry to mislead you. I had nothing to say about the Thunder. I just thought it was sort of coincidental that we gained a thunder and lost a bolt almost simultaneously, so I dropped in the reference on the headline to the blog.
Rick (4 years ago)
The first set of golf clubs I got back in the '60s were some signature "Tommy Bolts" made by Wilson. Unfortunately the skill Tommy Bolt brought to golf never successfully transferred over to my first set of golf clubs, although I bet I did toss a few.
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Tulsa World sports writer Jimmie Tramel is a former class president at Locust Grove High School. He graduated magna cum laude from Northeastern State University with a journalism degree and, while attending college, was sports editor of the Pryor Daily Times. He joined the Tulsa World on Oct. 17, 1989, the same day an earthquake struck the World Series. He is the OSU basketball beat writer and a columnist and feature writer during football season. In 2007, he wrote a book about Oklahoma State football with former Cowboy coach Pat Jones.

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