The famed "1-iron" photo of Ben Hogan following through at Merion Golf Club in 1950.
For 10 days or so in March of 1949, doctors were gravely concerned about the condition of Ben Hogan, who a month before had confronted death in a traumatic accident near Van Horn in West Texas.
He was indifferent, and he didn’t care to see anyone.
Then one day, he was back with the snap of the fingers.
“He hollered murder when we took him off cigarettes last week,” said one doctor in a news report from those days. Down close to 30 pounds since the accident, Hogan also rediscovered his appetite.
“We won’t say when,” said one doctor speaking for the others, “but don’t worry — Ben will be back.”
As Tiger Woods makes his highly anticipated return to golf at the Masters on Thursday after his horrifying accident 14 months ago that almost left him without a leg, he has only to look at Hogan’s remarkable comeback in the middle of the 20th century as inspiration.
And Woods, highly reverent of the history of his sport, is mindful of it.
“What he went through — obviously, he didn’t have the technology that we have now,” Woods said this week at Augusta National.
“The amount of hot tubs that he would have to take pre-round, post-round, in the middle of the night, just to be able to get up and swing a club the next day, I certainly appreciate that.”
Given Woods’ injuries, Tiger continued, and the treatments of Hogan’s day, “I wouldn’t be playing this week, that’s for sure.”
Hogan suffered a broken left ankle, a fractured collarbone, multiple fractures in the pelvis, and a damaged rib when his car, which also carried his wife Valerie as a passenger, was struck head-on by bus.
In the aftermath of surgery to repair his injuries, he also developed what was described as a serious blood clot condition that compromised his life.
“I can remember as a youngster waking up in the middle of the night hearing my father on the phone,” said Marty Leonard of her father Marvin Leonard, a founder of both Leonard’s Department Store and Colonial Country Club and who was very close to Hogan. “Daddy had some connections with at Carswell [Air Force Base]. They were trying to fly Dr. Ochsner, who was in New Orleans, to operate on Hogan.”
Alton Ochsner, a professor of surgery at Tulane University who had flown to El Paso on an Army airplane, called the surgery a “complete success.” The doctor said he had made an incision in Hogan’s abdomen and tied off the vein from where the clots had appeared.
It was similar, the doctor said, to “turning off a water faucet.”
“We removed the danger of any more clots,” he told reporters then, “and another one could have been fatal.”
He predicted that Hogan would be “up and around in a few months.” Up and around is different from walking 72 holes and competing at golf's highest level.
History tells us how this remarkable story ended. In June of 1950, 17 months after the accident, Hogan, then in his mid-30s, won the U.S. Open at Merion Golf Club, and he went on to win six more majors. (Conversely, Woods is in his mid-40s.)
The “Miracle at Merion” is still remembered as one of sport’s great triumphs, as well as sportsmanship.
On the 12th tee in the final round, Hogan, who played in terrible pain, had twisted his right knee on his drive. From that point on, he couldn’t bend down to pick up his ball off the green. His playing partner Cary Middleton marked his ball when it needed to be lifted, and both caddies took turns retrieving the ball from the hole.
Hogan’s first tournament after the accident, however, was in January of that year at one of his favorite layouts at the Los Angeles Open.
“Hogan Plans To Play in Riviera Meet,” the headline blared. Riviera Country Club had been site of three previous Hogan victories, in 1942, 1947, and 1948. Like Woods’ announcement that he would play the Masters this week, Hogan’s declaration was a “happy surprise” to the golfing community.
“It’s all a question of my legs,” Hogan said when asked if this was a good idea less than a year after the accident and blood clot surgery. “They’re been tiring in the latter parts of the [practice] rounds.”
Amazingly, Hogan pushed Sam Snead to a playoff before falling short in what journalists were already calling “the greatest golf comeback of all time.” As if prompted by the golf gods — or an even higher power perhaps — the 18-hole playoff was pushed back a week because of rain, giving Hogan the time he desperately needed to recover from the 72 holes he had just completed.
“I was lousy,” Hogan said after the playoff he lost by 5 strokes. Three months later, Hogan finished tied for fourth at the Masters.
“He was terrific,” Snead said of Riviera. “He’s the same old Hogan. He scares you to death.”
