CNN
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The famous Shannamaker Trophy is the biggest and heavy in golf, but don’t assume that it will not be lost for a minute.
This week, star-studded fields gather in North Carolina to fight for the coveted title for the PGA Championship at Quazlo Hollow, but that’s not the original glittering silverware pieces they’re competing in.
At 28 inches tall, 10.5 inches in diameter and weighing 27 pounds, the Wannamaker dates back to 1916 when the American PGA was founded.
Walter Hagen is one of the greatest sportsmen of all time. A superstar of his time. He is third on the all-time best list of 11 major winners, with only Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods behind 11 people.
Hagen won the PGA Championship five times in a total – a tally of the same records as Nickrous – four of these titles come in a row between 1924 and 1927, but what happened after the 1925 victory.
After his victory at the Olympia Fields Country Club near Chicago, Hagen later revealed that he lost the proud but highly honorable trophy while celebrating after he gave it to the taxi driver to bring him back to his hotel. The trophy did not reach its destination.
Now, imagine that you have to win a major golf tournament to keep your scary secrets safe. That was Hagen’s new reality.
A year later, Hagen appeared in the 1926 tournament to defend the title without the Wanamaker trophy. It was American rule of this era, and no one seriously questioned where the trophies actually lie, but after the third victory the question was finally asked. However, the champion was erect. He brushed it off and said he wasn’t going to abandon his title. “I won anyway, so I didn’t bring it,” he added.
True to his words, he won again a year later, but in the end all good things ended, and his incredible winning streak finally ended in the 1928 tournament after being defeated by his compatriot Leo Diegel. At that point, Hagen knew the game was up and he had to get clean.
The overlapping Wanamaker Trophy was created in 1926, but the original mysteriously appeared six years after it first disappeared before the 1931 PGA Championship.
Several reports from the early 1930s suggest that a trap maker was discovered at the Detroit Golf Factory, which made Hagen equipment.
The original 1916 trophy is named after Rodman Wanamaker, the heir of the department store who helped to create the PGA of America.
The original is currently on display at PGA, a new American home in Texas. That is, it is a duplicate that the champion maintains for a year. However, each winner can permanently hold a replica about 10% smaller than the original.
Walter Hagen was not one of the greatest players of all time, but also the ultimate showman and entertainer. “I didn’t want to be a billionaire. I wanted to live like a single person,” he was once famous.
The uncontroversial legend of the sport’s uncontroversial impact on golf is immeasurable. In addition to his 11 majors, he has won the PGA Tour 45 times. He won the US Open twice, and he was the first American-born golfer to win an open championship, trying to win the famous Claret Jug four times. He played a prominent role in the development of the Ryder Cup, which also served as the American team captain in the first six times the event was held.
Walter Hagen’s legacy is enduring and exciting. It is also indelibly intertwined with one of the most iconic trophies in the history of sports.