American Triumvirate: Sam Snead, Byron Nelson, Ben Hogan, and the Modern Age of Golf

In this celebration of three legendary champions on the centennial of their births in 1912, one of the most accomplished and successful writers about the game explains the circumstances that made each of them so singularly brilliant and how they, in turn, saved not only the professional tour but modern golf itself, thus making possible the subsequent popularity of players from Arnold Palmer to Tiger Woods.

During the Depression—after the exploits of Walter Hagen and Gene Sarazen and Bobby ...