This Day in Golf History: November 16

On this date in 1894, Wee Bobby Cruickshank was born in Scotland. He lost the 1923 U.S. Open to Bobby Jones in a playoff, but was a good enough player to be elected to the PGA Hall of Fame. In service during World War I he had been a POW. And let’s have a Masters pause on this day to focus on four-time winner Arnold Palmer: At the 68th Masters, on April 8-11, 2004, Arnie played his final Masters tournament. It would make another good Palmer book to do his career in the Masters only. The final playing chapter would be this tournament, his 50th straight and final time as a competitor. It seemed much earlier that he had been talking about calling it quits at Augusta, but he may have had 50 in mind all along, a number he reached at age 74. It wasn’t known at the time, but this was his final event on the regular PGA Tour schedule too. He left with a pair of rounds in the 80s: 84-84—168, missing the 36-hole cut by 20 strokes.