The Masters Book

The Masters golf tournament weaves a hypnotic spell. It is the toughest ticket in sports, with black-market tickets selling for $10,000 and more. Success at Augusta National breeds legends, while failure can overshadow even the most brilliant of careers. As it is the only major golf tournament to return to the same site year after year, much of the fascination is historical.

But as Curt Sampson, author of the bestselling Hogan, reveals in The Masters, a cold heart beats behind the warm antebellum faade of this famous Augusta course. And that heart belongs to the man who killed himself on the grounds two decades ago. Club and tournament founder Clifford Roberts, a New York stockbroker, still seems to run the place from his grave. Roberts, an elusive and reclusive figure, pulled the strings that made the Masters the greatest golf tournament in the world. His story--including his relationships with presidents, power brokers, and every golf champion from Bobby Jones to Arnold Palmer to Jack Nicklaus--has never been told. Until now.

No mere recitation of birdies, bogeys, and tourna-ment winners, The Masters is the intricate tale of the interplay among the town, the tournament, and the club. It is an amazing slice of history, taking us inside the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower, Augusta's most famous member. It is a look at how the new South coexists with the old South: the relationships between blacks and whites, between Southerners and North-erners, between rich and poor. It is a portrait of a tournament unlike any other as well as the town in which it lives and breathes--with such characters as James Brown, the Godfather of Soul; the great boxer Beau Jack; and Frank Stranahan, the playboy golfer and the only white pro ever banned from the tournament.

The Masters is a book that is certain to cause controversy yet will reinforce one's love for and dedication to the sport's greatest event. It is just as certain that The Masters will be the golf book of the year.