In 2008, the Wyndham Championship moves back to Sedgefield Country Club and becomes the only regular-season event on the PGA TOUR that is contested on a course originally designed by the legendary Donald Ross.   The Wyndham Championship is among the oldest events on the PGA TOUR, and the 2008 tournament is the 69th renewal of North Carolina’s oldest professional-golf event. 

The Greensboro Jaycees were barely a year old when the idea of a golf tournament began to take life. Dr. Alex Stanford had founded the chapter in 1936 and lawyer Ed Kuykendall Jr. was president in ’37 when Greensboro Daily News sports editor Laurence Leonard began pushing the idea, along with Starmount Forest County Club pro George Corcoran.  Starmount owner Edward B. Benjamin was solidly behind the notion and had been ever since Starmount had hosted the Carolinas Open of 1932, when Henry Picard beat the legendary Walter Hagen in a classic playoff.

As would be repeated later in the life of the tournament, it was the Greensboro business community that finally came to the rescue of the ambitious project.  At an August, 1937, meeting at the old O. Henry Hotel, attended by the core of the business and civic leadership of the city, including Joseph M. Bryan, the financial ($5,000) underpinning for the tournament was finalized.  Later that evening Fred Corcoran, PGA tournament manager, awarded Greensboro tour dates for the spring of 1938 and the Greater Greensboro Open was born. (It is important to note also that Starmount pro George Corcoran was a brother of the PGA’s Fred Corcoran, for this connection played a major role in the securing of the GGO’s original dates).

The GGO was given a spectacular boost into the national golf picture, from these modest beginnings, through its earliest champions – three of the first four tournaments were won by Sam Snead (’38), Ben Hogan (’40) and Byron Nelson (’41), who for years would dominate the game and remain among the all-time greats in golf.  The first five tournaments were played at both Starmount and Sedgefield. 

After skipping 1943 and ’44 because of World War II, the tournament resumed at Starmount Forest Country Club in 1945.  For the next 13 years, the Greater Greensboro Open alternated between Starmount and Sedgefield.  The tournament then moved to Starmount for three consecutive years.

Alternating between Sedgefield and Starmount was a popular arrangement that suited almost everybody until the 1960 tournament, which followed a hard winter and found Starmount not in the best of condition.  After winning the tournament for the seventh time, Sam Snead, who for years was said to have buried his money in tomato cans in his back yard, jokingly suggested that Edward Benjamin, who owned Starmount, dig up a few of his tomato cans and fix up the course before the next tournament.

Benjamin was not amused.  He banned Snead from Starmount for life and created a serious problem for the host courses, but with the tournament growing rapidly; it turned out to be a blessing.  Sedgefield, with vastly more space to handle the crowds, became the sole home of the tournament, beginning in 1967, and was a major contributor to its development during the next 10 years.

By the late 1970s, however, it was becoming increasingly evident that the tournament needed more space, and Sedgefield did not have it.  The membership at Sedgefield, and some of the residents around the course were becoming less and less enchanted with the annual invasion of their country club.  It was an agonizing and controversial decision, but the tournament moved to Forest Oaks Country Club, beginning with the 1977 event.  The tournament would be played at the Southeast Greensboro course for 31 consecutive years. 

As it turned out, the move was a good one.  Larger galleries and more sponsors than ever enabled the tournament to continue its growth, and the second tournament at Forest Oaks turned up the largest profit in GGO history, a whopping $174,219.  A decade and a half later the profits would reach $1 million.

In addition to the course rotation, the tournament has endured numerous name changes.  It began in 1938 as the Greater Greensboro Open.  That name held until 1998 when K-Mart joined the event as title sponsor.  The tournament then became the K-Mart Greater Greensboro Open.  After an eight-year relationship with K-Mart, Daimler-Chrysler became the title sponsor, and the tournament became the Greater Greensboro Chrysler Classic.  2003 was a year of change as the Forest Oaks course was redesigned by Davis Love III and his design company.  With the revamped course came new October tournament dates and the debut of the next event name, the Chrysler Classic of Greensboro.  In 2006, Daimler-Chrysler made a business decision to end its 11-year association with the Piedmont Triad’s PGA TOUR event.  Wyndham Worldwide signed on as the new title sponsor, and the Wyndham Championship will debut in 2007. 

Star-Studded Tournament
Probably never in the history of sport has an athlete bonded with a city not of his birth the way Sam Snead and Greensboro became intertwined through the years.  If there is, indeed, a defining moment in the life of a tournament, Greensboro’s was when Snead began to call it “my second home.”

In 1965, Sam Snead was about ready to take his place as a relic of the past.  He was being honored on the occasion of his 25th appearance in the GGO, which that year had one of the strongest PGA TOUR fields of the year, including Arnold Palmer, Gary Player, Billy Casper and Julius Boros in their prime.  He proceeded to win the tournament by five shots with four sub-70 rounds, and at age 52 years, 10 months and 8 days became the oldest player ever to win a PGA Tour event – the record still stands today.

2003 Champion Shigeki Maruyama Photo Credit: Anthony Vinson Smith

But that was not the end of Greensboro’s love affair with Snead.  Twenty-three years later he would return to help celebrate the tournament’s 50th anniversary, to see the street leading to Starmount Forest Country Club renamed Sam Snead Drive.  On the 60th anniversary of the tournament, he returned again to celebrate the establishment of the Sam Snead Cup, which goes now to the winner of the tournament.

Slammin’ Sammy won the then Greater Greensboro Open eight times from 1938 to ’65; the record is still the TOUR mark for victories at an event.  Other notable winners include Ben Hogan, Byron Nelson, Julius Boros, Gary Player, Al Geiberger, Billy Casper, Gene Littler, George Archer, Chi Chi Rodriguez, Davis Love, III, Mark O’Meara, Larry Nelson, Seve Ballesteros, Lanny Wadkins and Raymond Floyd.

The Wyndham Championship has been a cornerstone of the Piedmont Triad sports landscape for nearly seven decades, but as is the case with all PGA TOUR events, the primary goal of the Wyndham Championship is to raise money for charity.  Since 2006, the tournament has been setting an annual goal of at least $1 million in donations to local charities, but that goal has only been within reach in recent years.  In 2005, the tournament donated $842,000 to local charities.  The previous five years saw consistent growth in Wyndham Championship charitable contributions.  The tournament donated $620,000 following the 2004 event, $438,000 in ‘03, $220,000 in ‘02, and $112,000 went to local charities following the ‘01 tournament. 

Historical Moments

1939
After a three day snow-out, Ben Hogan dominated the competition with a 12-under-par performance and went on to win by nine strokes.  He arrived in Greensboro with a North/South Open win, the first of his career.

1940 
Ben Hogan won a tournament that was delayed three days by snow.  Hogan played 36 spectacular holes on the Thursday following the scheduled final round to win by nine strokes at Sedgefield.

1942
Sam Byrd, former backup player for Babe Ruth and the New York Yankees, produced a final-round rally to win the tournament.  Byrd is still the only Major League Baseball player to win a PGA TOUR event. 

1945
Byron Nelson won the tournament at Starmount Forest Country Club during his record-setting streak of 11 straight PGA TOUR wins.  Nelson defeated Sam Byrd by eight strokes. 

1947
Tall Vic Gheszi played the ball and the mud with equal skill to win the tournament in which no golfer broke par in 72 holes of stroke play.

1950
With what PGA TOUR officials called the largest crowd ever on the winter tour watching, Sam Snead won with rounds of 66-70-66-67 in perfect springtime weather at Sedgefield.  The tournament actually ran out of tickets, and officials went to Cone Mills to print more for the weekend.

1952
Sam Snead finished tied for first with Dave Doyle and seemed headed to a playoff.  However, the playoff never happened because the tournament was settled after a rules discussion regarding Snead’s second shot at the 17th hole at Starmount.  At the par three, Snead’s tee shot landed in the creek, and he incorrectly played the ball on the green side of the creek.  Long after play was complete, he was assessed a two-stroke penalty giving him a new four-round total of 279.  The resulting penalty moved Snead from a tie for first place to third, two strokes behind Doyle, who finished with 277 and was declared the winner.

1960
Since its inception in 1938, the tournament alternated between Sedgefield and Starmount Forest Country Clubs.  The 1960 tournament followed a hard winter in the Piedmont Triad, and at tournament time, Starmount wasn’t in the best of conditions.  After winning the tournament for the seventh time, Snead jokingly suggested that Starmount owner Edward Benjamin spend some of his money to fix up the course before the next tournament.  Benjamin was not amused and banned Snead from Starmount for life making Sedgefield the then permanent home of the tournament.  Also in 1960, Thorne Wood fired a first-round 66 and became the first left-handed golfer in PGA TOUR history to lead an official event.

1961
When Mose Kiser Jr. and his colleagues began preparations for the 1961 GGO, the Civil Rights Act was still some four years down the road and the impact of the Feb. 1, 1960, Greensboro Sit-Ins at Woolworth’s was just beginning to be felt across the nation.  With full support from the host club, Sedgefield, the tournament decided it was time to open its arms across the racial divide and issued a personal invitation to Charlie Sifford to participate in the 1961 tournament.
 
Sifford, a seasoned and accomplished competitor who grew up caddying in Charlotte, graciously accepted, becoming the first African-American to play in a PGA TOUR event in the Old South.  Sifford had already played in a TOUR event in California.  Sifford led the first round at Greensboro with a 68, trailed by only three strokes after three rounds and wound up tied for fourth behind winner Mike Souchak, Sam Snead and Billy Maxwell. There were some racial hecklers along the way, but, for the most part, he was welcomed in a dignified manner befitting his stature in the game and in his native state.  Six months later, the Caucasian Clause came out of the PGA TOUR bylaws. 

1965
Sam Snead won his PGA TOUR record-setting eighth Greater Greensboro Open.  He won the first GGO in 1938, and when he won his eighth 27 years later, he became the TOUR’s oldest tournament winner at age 52 years, 10 months and eight days.  The tournament hosted its first champion’s banquet and honored Snead on the occasion of his 25th appearance in the Greater Greensboro Open.  Ed Sullivan was the Toastmaster. 

1966
While corporate sponsorship was something tournament organizers wanted to avoid, it was taking hold and threatening independent tournaments.  However, the tournament finally decided to take at least a partial step toward commercial help. The decision came when Allied Chemical, a major supplier of the textile industry, approached the tournament about becoming a limited partner in the tournament sponsorship.
Doug Galyon, a member of the tournament’s executive committee, was asked to be the liaison in the negotiations and a deal was struck beginning with the 1966 GGO.  Allied would be called a participating sponsor in exchange for providing the first prize money of $20,000. “That enabled us to go to a six-figure ($100,000) purse for the first time,” Galyon recalls.  “That took us to the next level of tournaments on the tour, and Allied used it an occasion to entertain its customers during tournament week.” The first corporate sponsorship for the Piedmont Triad’s PGA TOUR event eventually led to a title sponsor, though that would not come until two decades later.

1968
Billy Casper won the tournament at Sedgefield, his second victory in this event.  The final round was postponed due to the April 4 assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.

1969
Four players competed in a five-hole sudden-death playoff, the largest playoff in tournament history.  Gene Littler sank a curling 12-foot putt at the 15th hole to defeat Julius Boros, Orville Moody and Tom Weiskkopf.

1970
Arnold Palmer was the leader or tied for the lead after each of the first three rounds of the tournament.  Gary Player fired a final-round 65 to win the tournament by two strokes at Sedgefield Country Club; it was the lowest final-round score by a tournament winner at Sedgefield.  Palmer finished tied for fifth, five shots back. 

1972
Arnold Palmer held a two-stroke lead in the final round when he teed off on the par-three 16th hole at Sedgefield and appeared headed to an easy victory.  Palmer put his tee shot into the creek beside the 16th green and tried to play out of the shallow water there.  That decision cost him the tournament as he recorded a triple-bogey six and finished third.  George Archer defeated Tommy Aaron on the second hole of the playoff to win the tournament.

1976
Al Geiberger won the Greater Greensboro Open in what was then the last tournament at Sedgefield Country Club.  Geiberger defeated Lee Trevino by two strokes to claim the $46,000 first-place check.  The tournament moved to Forest Oaks Country Club the following year where it stayed for 31 years. 

1978
Playing in his first United States tournament, Spain’s Seve Ballesteros won the Greater Greensboro Open at age 20 years and 11 months.  However, Ballesteros did not return to defend his title and never played in the tournament again.

1979
Fayetteville’s Raymond Floyd defeated George Burns and Gary Player in a playoff at Forest Oaks and became the first North Carolina native to win the tournament.  Two-time winner Davis Love III is the only other native North Carolinian to win the tournament. 

1988
The GGO’s 50th anniversary was marked by the tournament’s final step into the world of corporate sponsorship.  K-Mart came aboard as the title sponsor, enabling the tournament to return to the level of the PGA TOUR elite with a $1 million purse – for the four previous tournaments, the purse fell below the tour average.  Now it was above the average by more than $200,000.

The 50th anniversary also turned into a major homecoming.  Snead came back again, so did two-time winner Byron Nelson and a long line of other former winners.  Snead, Nelson, Raymond Floyd and Lanny Wadkins were featured speakers at the celebration banquet, following a special nine-hole pro-am at Sedgefield for former champions and GGO regulars from earlier days.

Meantime, before and just following the 50th anniversary tournament, perhaps the most significant negotiations in GGO history to date were under way.  When the smoke cleared, Greensboro, which had been stuck for years with the week just before the Masters, had new dates two weeks following the Augusta classic.  It also returned to the PGA TOUR’s national broadcast TV schedule on CBS Sports.  Sandy Lyle won the K-Mart Greater Greensboro Open in a sudden death playoff with Ken Green, who was best known for his green golf shoes.

1992
There have been many stirring finishes to the GGO, KGGO, GGCC (Greater Greensboro Chrysler Classic), Chrysler Classic of Greensboro and now the Wyndham Championship. But, perhaps the one that many now refer to as the granddaddy of them all occurred in 1992 and was produced by one of only two North Carolinians ever to win here – Davis Love III.  He started the final round three shots behind, yet won the tournament by a whopping six strokes, posting a course-record 31-31--62 that included two eagles on holes where he did not even have to putt.

After birdies at the first two holes, he hit a 117-yard wedge to the seventh that landed about six inches behind the pin and backed up into the cup for an eagle two. When he came to the par five15th, he had birdied three more times and was comfortably in the lead.  But his heroics were not over.  He smashed a 310-yard drive onto the flat of the distant hill, then sailed a 1-iron over the green and into the back bunker.  Not to worry; he blasted out perfectly – right into the cup for an eagle three.  The crowd erupted into a celebration seldom, if ever, equaled in the history of the tournament. Many in the crowd were good friends, including many former classmates at UNC Chapel Hill.

Amazingly, he almost holed out for another eagle on the very next hole, his pitching wedge approach stopping barely two inches to the right of the pin. “That’s one that should have gone in,” Love was quoted as saying later, only partly in jest.  It was that kind of day, one that will endure as long as stories of great golf days and Greensboro are recounted.

1993
The tournament announced a purse increase to $1.5 million and a new logo for the event.

1994
Rocco Mediate and 1990 champion Steve Elkington went head-to-head for four playoff holes following regulation play.  Mediate pulled out the win earning his second-career PGA TOUR win.

1996
The tournament purse increased to $1.8 million; the Daimler-Chrysler Corporation assumed title sponsorship. 

2001
The Chrysler Classic of Greensboro hired Tournament Director Mark Brazil to bring consistency to the tournament.  Brazil would work closely with the Greensboro Jaycees to stage the tournament each year.

2003
In 2003, the tournament moved from its traditional spring date to the fall and became the Chrysler Classic of Greensboro.  With the new name came a renewed Forest Oaks Country Club.  The original Ellis Maples course was redesigned by Davis Love III and his course design company.  The new design added length and “bite” to the course increasing total yardage to 7,311.  Daimler-Chrysler increased its involvement as the tournament purse grew to $5 million making the Chrysler Classic the most lucrative stop in the Tour’s “Fall Finish.”

2005
In 2005, the Greensboro Jaycees Charitable Foundation Board was formed to oversee tournament operations.  Immediately after the formation of the board, tournament director Mark Brazil began reporting directly to the Greensboro Jaycees Charitable Foundation Board rather than the Greensboro Jaycees.  When the PGA TOUR announced its re-alignment, the Piedmont Triad’s PGA TOUR event earned a coveted date during the FedEx Cup portion of the season starting in 2007.  The Piedmont Triad’s PGA TOUR event become the last regular-season event before the four-tournament FedEx Cup Championship series.  

2006
In January, the tournament learned that the Daimler-Chrysler Corporation would not return as the title sponsor in 2007 making 2006 the final year of the Chrysler Classic of Greensboro.  Just prior to the 2006 tournament, Wyndham Worldwide was introduced as the new title sponsor of the Piedmont Triad’s PGA TOUR event.  The tournament would be called the Wyndham Championship starting in 2007 removing Greensboro from the tournament’s name for the first time.  Davis Love III became just the eighth multiple winner of the Piedmont Triad’s PGA TOUR event when he won the 2006 tournament recording four rounds in the 60s.  The man who did the re-design of the Forest Oaks Country Club layout just three years earlier battled cold, wet conditions to win the tournament by two strokes over Jason Bohn.  Love, who also won the event in 1992, joined Sam Snead (8), Sandy Lyle (2), Danny Edwards (2), George Archer (2), Billy Casper (2), Doug Sanders (2) and Byron Nelson (2) as multiple winners. 

2007
In the first tournament played in August, PGA TOUR rookie Brandt Snedeker won the inaugural Wyndham Championship and became the 13th first-time winner in tournament history.  Other first-time winners were Sam Byrd (1942), Art Doering (1951), Earl Stewart (1953), Stan Leonard (1967), Bob Goalby (1958), Bud Allin (1971), Danny Edwards (1977), Seve Ballesteros (1978), Joey Sindelar (1985), Steve Elkington (1990), Mike Springer (1994) and Frank Nobilo (1997).  In December, Snedeker was named the PGA TOUR’s Rookie of the Year with his Wyndham Championship title as the centerpiece of his rookie season.  Also in 2007, the board that oversees tournament operations was renamed the Piedmont Triad Charitable Foundation Board reflecting the continued regionalization of the Piedmont Triad’s PGA TOUR event.  In addition, the Donald Ross-designed course at Sedgefield Country Club was restored to its original design and modernized for today’s PGA TOUR players.  The $3 million restoration process, led by Donald Ross course expert Kris Spence, took 10 months to complete, and the course re-opened to members in September.  After the Wyndham Championship concluded, tournament officials began negotiations to move the tournament from Forest Oaks Country Club back to Sedgefield. 

2008
The Wyndham Championship returns to Sedgefield Country Club beginning with the 2008 tournament.  In a February 20 news conference, tournament officials cited a restored Donald Ross original golf course, close proximity to the Grandover Resort where most players and sponsors stay as well as a course located much closer to the center of the Piedmont Triad as reasons for moving the tournament.  The course will cover some 7,150 yards and play to a par 70.  After 31 years at Forest Oaks Country Club, the Wyndham Championship would again be contested on one of the courses where the tournament began in 1938.

Note: Irwin Smallwood contributed to this tournament history.  Smallwood is a retired former golf writer, sports editor and managing editor of the Greensboro News & Record and the old Greensboro Daily News.  He has observed the Piedmont Triad’s PGA TOUR event since the late 1940s.  In 1999 he was Honorary Chairman of the Greater Greensboro Chrysler Classic.

Other past champions include:

Past Tournament Champions

 

 

 

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