The Key West Citizen

Bolt Battled Anger, Snead In PGA Tournament For 1st Win

Threatened To Walk Out Half Way Through His Match
By HUGH FULLERTON JR.
ST. PAUL, Minn. (P) - Tommy Bolt, a perfectionist among golf pros who can't understand why the galleries don't admire perfection, figures he made a lot of friends out on the hot stretches of the Keller course.
At least, he was around to meet Chick Harbert, the man who persuaded him not to walk out on the tournament, in one of today's semifinals of the PGA Championship. He wasn't hanging from a tree, as he had predicted.
The other 36-hole semifinal brought together defending champion Walter Burkemo and former Open champion Cary Middlecoff.
Bolt, whose temper operates on a hair trigger, battled anger and Sammy Snead yesterday and finally won out over both on the 39th hole.
Halfway through the match he threatened to walk out because of what he called unfair treatment by the galleries. Strangely, it was Harbert who persuaded him to continue.
After a couple of club-throwing tantrums and an incident on the 18th green, when a few spectators applauded a missed Bolt putt, Tommy angrily proclaimed that he wouldn't tee off in the afternoon.
"They treat Snead like a favorite son; if I won they'd probably hang me from the nearest tree," he said.
But before the finish, the fans were cheering Bolt for his dogged persistence in sticking with the favorite and at the end he used up one of his rare smiles and remarked:
"I guess I made some friends out there this afternoon. But wait until you see the headlines tomorrow: they'll say 'Snead loses on the 39th.'"
That's just about what Sammy did. He hit his second shot on the 39th like a duffer-smothering a wood shot on the 510-yard hole and sending it only about 80 yards.
He took bogey 6 to lose the hole as Bolt made his par 5.
From the fourth hole to the 39th, Bolt never was ahead. But he never let Snead get more than a two-hole margin either. Then, two down with only four holes to go, the unsmiling Bolt kept the pressure of steady pars on his tiring opponent and caught up at the 34th.
Harbert, beat Jerry Barber 1-up over the 36-hole route.
The only easy victory went to Burkemo, the snub-nosed scrapper who thrives on match play. He caught Argentina's Roberto de Vicenzo on a bad day and trounced him 5 and 4. Middlecoff, who almost blew his match twice on the front nine only to recover coming back, turned back Shelley Mayfield 3 and 1.