American-born Jack Fleck, a former municipal course pro from Iowa who was engaged in the D. Day invasion at Normandy but who went from virtual obscurity to fame in stunning golf fans by defeating the great Ben Hogan to win a play-off for the 1955 U.S. Open title, passed away today (Friday) at age 92 years and four months old.
Fleck was the oldest-living US Open winner and nine months younger than Australia’s revered Kel Nagle, winner of the 1960 Open Championship, who remains golf’s oldest-living Major Champion.
As already widely reported Fleck had been a full-time PGA Tour for around six months when he teed-up in the 1955 U.S. Open at The Olympic Club in suburban San Francisco.
He opened with a no frills score of 76 to be nine shots adrift of Tommy Bolt, but made up the deficit and still the largest in U.S. Open history to eventually join Hogan in the lead at the end of regulation play with a seven over par 287 total.
Hogan had ended his round some time earlier, and with NBC TV declaring him as the champion before it went off the air. There was plenty to congratulate Hogan including the great Gene Sarazen in what would have been Hogan’s record fifth U.S. Open win.
Fleck was two shots behind Hogan after bogeys at the 14th hole but then birdied the 15th ahead of then making two pars ahead of draining an 8-foot putt at the last in a round of 67 and join a tie Hogan in the lead.
Jack Fleck wins 1955 US Open as Ben Hogan looks on.
As is customary in the U.S. Open, the 18-hole play-off was conducted the next day with Fleck heading the to the final hole with a one-shot lead over his more fancied rival.
But the unthinkable happened with Hogan sending his final drive into deep rough and taking three shots to get back onto the fairway from where he made double bogey and lose by three shots with a 72 to Fleck’s 69.
The Golf Channel reports an interesting sidelight to the Fleck/Hogan Open legend is that Hogan was Fleck’s idol.
Fleck was playing a custom-made set of Ben Hogan clubs, and Hogan himself had personally delivered him a couple of wedges. In pictures of the two taken after the playoff, Hogan is looking at Fleck holding the trophy and has a smile every bit as big as Fleck’s.
“I remember his reaction very much,” said Fleck in an interview last year.
“I thought he would be disappointed with the fact he didn’t play to his highest level. But he was very nice and very appreciative even though he lost the playoff.”
Although the win will always be considered a major upset, Fleck proved it wasn’t a fluke by going on to win two more PGA Tour events – the 1960 Phoenix Open Invitational (in a playoff over Bill Collins) and the 1961 Bakersfield Open (in a playoff over Bob Rosburg).
He was in two other playoffs as well, losing to George Bayer in the 1960 St. Petersburg Open Invitational and to Arnold Palmer in the 1960 Insurance City Open.
Fleck also made a run at another Open championship – finishing in a six-way tie for third, three shots behind winner Arnold Palmer, in the 1960 Open at Cherry Hills.
Fleck left the PGA Tour in 1963 and worked as a club pro in Wisconsin, Illinois and California. In 1977, at age 55 he qualified for the U.S. Open but missed the cut at Southern Hills.
In 1979, a year before the Champions Tour, then known as the Senior PGA Tour, was founded, Fleck won the PGA Seniors’ Championship in a playoff. in 1995 he teamed with Bolt to win the Demaret Division of the Liberty Mutual Legands of Golf.
Fleck turned pro in 1939, working as an assistant pro at the Des Moines Country Club. His golf career was interrupted by World War II, in which he served as a U.S. Navy quartermaster.
Fleck also participated in the D-Day invasion, serving on a ship that provided fire in support of the landing of troops on Normandy’s Utah Beach and with this year to be the 70th anniversary of the landings.
