Almost 50 years have passed since Skip Manning was persuaded to duck under the ropes at Cherry Hills Country Club and grab the visor Arnold Palmer joyously tossed high in the air after winning a tournament one author called “Golf’s Greatest Championship.”
Manning took the visor, which was immortalized by a famous photo from the 1960 U.S. Open, with him in all the moves he made over the years — to Wyoming, Washington, California, Arizona, Wisconsin, and back to Colorado. When all was said and done, he figured that when Palmer eventually passed away, Manning would have the visor appraised and see what it was worth.
But in the end, any desire Manning had to make money off his precious memento gave way to the satisfaction of sharing it with Palmer — and the rest of the golf world.
“With all I’ve done in golf, and all golf has done for me, (potentially selling the visor) would cheapen the whole experience,” Manning said in an interview this week. “”¦ It has honor where it is.”
And where it is is in Far Hills, N.J., at the newly renovated U.S. Golf Association Museum, now called the United States Golf Association Museum and Arnold Palmer Center for Golf History. It’s been there since shortly after Manning — now a resident of Fort Collins — went to Palmer’s home course in Latrobe, Pa., to present it to the USGA with Palmer there in person on Sept. 25.
Fort Collins’ Skip Manning (right) and USGA Museum assistant director David Normoyle (left) met with Arnold Palmer in late September and Manning proceeded to present Arnie’s 1960 U.S. Open visor to the USGA Museum.
Billionaire Donald Trump, who would be playing golf with Palmer that day in a charity event, playfully noted to Manning after his donation that he would have paid $5 million for the visor.
“When Trump offered the money, Arnold was behind us pumping his thumbs up in the air,” Manning relayed. “He said, “˜Right on. It’s not about the money.'”
Apparently not.
Many people — especially ones with an appreciation for golf history — would consider Palmer’s visor priceless. USGA Museum assistant director David Normoyle, who joined Manning and his wife in meeting Palmer in late September, put the visor in the same class as treasures such as the “Calamity Jane” putter Bobby Jones used en route to the Grand Slam in 1930, and the 1-iron Ben Hogan utilized in winning the 1950 U.S. Open.
“For us in the museum, from a historical perspective, it’s one of the most important artifacts we have in our entire collection,” Normoyle said Thursday. “It captures a moment a lot of people can identify with — what’s called by many one of the most significant U.S. Opens ever because of the convergence of Palmer, Hogan and (Jack) Nicklaus.”
Because the visor was acquired after the renovation and expansion of the USGA Museum was unveiled in June, a permanent display case hasn’t yet been established. For the time being, the visor can be seen in a recent-acquisitions case not far from the new Arnold Palmer Room.
The visor gained its place in golf history largely thanks to a photo taken the final day of the “˜60 Open at Cherry Hills. In it, after winning what would be his one and only U.S. Open title, Palmer is seen flinging the visor high in the air after sinking his final putt on the 18th green.
Fred Manning III, known as Skip, was then 11 years old and had staked out a spot on the 18th green since early in the day that June Saturday, when the final 36 holes of the tournament were played. Skip had learned his lesson the previous two days, when he tried to move around the course and battled the crowds to get a view of the action — often unsuccessfully, given his size. So Skip stayed near the 18th green, a high point from which you can see some of the action on other holes.
Seven shots out of first place entering the final round, Palmer roared up the leaderboard, driving the green on the par-4 first hole en route to a 65, which held off an aging Hogan and a chubby amateur named Nicklaus. And when the King arrived at the 18th green, Manning was right in the front row, just behind the gallery ropes.
After Palmer clinched the victory, he flung his red visor, which landed just in front of Manning, on the other side of the ropes. Fellow fans urged the youngster to go grab it, knowing that he had been there longer than any of them. Manning reluctantly did so, then had Palmer autograph the visor near the scorer’s tent a little later.
“I hung on to it for 48 years,” said Manning, who will turn 60 in March. “After a while it started to get dirty, so we got it framed about 20 years ago. I bet I didn’t show it to a dozen people over the years, but I knew how important it was. And then when I was watching the (2008) U.S. Open at Torrey Pines, they announced that the USGA was opening a new Arnold Palmer (Room at the) museum. I said, ‘That’s where the visor should go.'”
And that’s where it eventually went, but it took an old acquaintance to facilitate the donation. When Manning was a professional at Sea Ranch Golf Links in northern California, he had once played a round with Golf Digest course rater Steve Frank, and mentioned that he had the visor. Then last year, after the Palmer Room of the USGA Museum opened, Frank, now a USGA committeeman, went to great lengths to find Manning. He finally located him through the Colorado Golf Association, which had an e-mail address after Manning had competed in various CGA events from 2005-07.
When Frank and Manning eventually made contact, and Frank asked Manning to donate the visor, Manning told him that he would, but he had a couple of conditions, the most notable being that he wanted to do it in front of Palmer himself. So a get-together was arranged for late September in Latrobe, where Palmer was scheduled to play golf with Trump and an industrialist who had bid $750,000 in a charity auction for the privilege of accompanying the two celebrities.
That day, “I said to Arnold, ‘I’ve had your autograph for 48 years and I’d like to get a new one,'” Manning relayed. “So he autographed Julian Graubart’s book (about the ’60 Open) “˜Golf’s Greatest Championship.’ And on a black and white picture of him throwing the visor, he wrote, ‘To Skip, Thanks for keeping care of my visor for 48 years.’ He’s class all the way.”
Palmer even acquiesced to the request by Kate, Manning’s wife, to autograph her hand, as Palmer had done on Kate’s mother’s hand 40 years prior.
“Steve Frank told (Palmer) the story about how he got hold of me, and I told him my story from the 1960 Open, and Arnold just beamed,” Skip Manning said.
The Mannings also received a tour of Palmer’s private museum, which included the tractor from his old Pennzoil commercials, TV footage of his biggest wins, countless contestant badges, clubs, golf bags, etc. “He never throws anything away,” Manning said.
When Palmer and Manning’s group emerged from their meeting and came into the room where Trump was, “the industrialist said, “˜What did those people want (meaning the Mannings and Normoyle). And Arnie said, ‘they didn’t want anything. They gave something back to me.’ After that, the industrialist thanked me five or six times.”
Grabbing Palmer’s visor as an 11-year-old was a fitting cap — pardon the pun — of a magical week for Manning at the 1960 U.S. Open. Manning’s uncle, longtime Cherry Hills head professional Rip Arnold, competed in the tournament but missed the cut. Earlier in the week, Skip had caddied for his father, Fred Manning, a member at Cherry Hills who was playing practice rounds with various competitors. Skip’s father was paired with Sam Snead one day early in the week, and Hogan another.
The day Manning’s dad played with Hogan, they encountered a backup on the 17th hole at Cherry Hills, and Skip was idly swinging his father’s left-handed driver. Hogan noted that he was a true left-hander who played golf right-handed. With that, Hogan took the club and hit a drive 240-250 yards lefty. Then long-hitting pro George Bayer said that he, too, was a left-hander who played golf right-handed, and he tried a southpaw swing and hit the ball 270.
Skip’s dad subsequently asked Hogan why his equipment company didn’t make left-handed sets at the time. Hogan said it would as soon as he could make them look as good as right-handed sets. Lo and behold, a couple of years later, a UPS truck pulled up to the Manning residence. The driver brought to the door a left-handed set of Hogan clubs for Skip’s dad, free of charge.
After more than two decades as a pro himself, Manning regained his amateur status several years ago, but he hasn”˜t played since 2007 because of shoulder problems — and he doesn”˜t particularly miss it. “I’ve played so many rounds of golf, the last thing I want to do in retirement is play golf every day,” he said.
Manning, who moved to Fort Collins in 2000, is semi-retired these days, though he works on some multi-level marketing.
