News

1940-1949: NYSGA Men's Senior Amateur Championship, Effects of WWII, NY's Big Four, A Five-Peat

VIEW THE DIGITAL PDF VERSION OF THE BOOKLET

NYSGA Men’s Senior Amateur Championship

The NYSGA held a new event in 1940 in Syracuse focused on a rapidly increasing population of male golfers, age 50 and over (had since been increased to age 55) — the Men’s Senior Amateur Championship.

The 1941 rendition was won by the first NYSGA president, Sherrill Sherman. Still actively engaged in NYSGA governance decades later, Sherman was the first to win as a sitting member of the executive committee, and it may have been the most celebrated.

However, the decade belonged to Duane Tower, the many-time Niagara Falls club champion. Tower took home the statewide senior trophy in 1942 (Niagara Falls), 1944 (Lake Placid Club), 1945 (Oak Hill East), and in 1946 (Yahnundasis).

Duane Tower of Niagara Falls claimed the NYS Men's Senior Am four times in the 1940s and was a NYSGA President from 1947-49.

Effects of WWII

The 1940s started with war raging in Europe. With every passing month, expectation increased that the United States would be sucked into the chaos, which it was in December 1941. Like the Great Depression a decade before, sports became an afterthought. What mattered was getting our soldiers, sailors and airmen home from World War II.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in an effort to salvage some normalcy, demanded that all sports continue play, despite an obvious shortfall of players. The USGA held its Open championship in 1941, but then shuttered the event until 1946. The Masters was not played from 1943 to ’45. 

Focused as it was on the amateur game, the NYSGA continued play throughout the war years. However, the organization, led ably by veteran golf administrator Theodore Merseles of Siwanoy, made some adjustments. The Red Cross became the beneficiary of all NYSGA tournament entry net revenue, and each NYSGA club was encouraged to hold monthly Pearl Harbor tournaments, with proceeds going to the Red Cross. For efficiency’s sake and to eliminate barriers to play, the NYSGA often conducted the men’s, women’s and/or men’s senior amateurs simultaneously, most notably at the Lake Placid Club in 1943 and ’44.

The immediate effect of the NYSGA’s decision to stay active was positive. The 1942 NYSGA Board announced that the roster of New York clubs reached a record of 101.

Spectators watching the NYSGA Championships at Lake Placid Club in the 1940s.

New York’s Big Four

While the nation started noticing the quality of New York golfers on the national scene in the 1930s, it was in the 1940s that the question “Who is the best amateur golfer in the state?” became a contentious conversation. While several names could be considered (see Goodwin), four were really in contention: Ray Billows, Dick Chapman, Willie Turnesa and Sam Urzetta. 

Billows, who worked for a printing company in Poughkeepsie, was the “everyman” champion, a player from humble means who somehow managed to carve out an amazingly rich — and national — resume over three decades. Amateur golf was the province of the affluent in those days. How Billows was able to not just keep up, but to thrive, is difficult to comprehend. 

In the course of his journey, he played golf with Bob Jones and Byron Nelson, competed in two Masters, represented the U.S. on two Walker Cup squads (1938 at St. Andrews in Scotland and 1949 at Winged Foot) and was a finalist in three U.S. Amateurs (1937, ’39 and ‘48), unfortunately losing each. Oh, and he won a record seven NYSGA Men’s Amateur championships (1935, ’37, ’40, ’41, ’43, ’45, ’49).

Ray Billows of Poughkeepsie, has won the most NYS Men's Am titles with seven total between 1935-1949.

Willie Turnesa, like Billows, was a New Yorker without a country club background and the youngest of seven brothers, all golf professionals, who pooled their resources to get him to Holy Cross. But they didn’t ask young Willie not to play. In the year he graduated from Holy Cross, 1938, Turnesa won the NYSGA State Amateur, held at Quaker Ridge, and later that year the U.S. Amateur at Oakmont in Pittsburgh. 

After WWII, Turnesa captured his second U.S. Amateur in 1948 (besting Billows in the final) and the 1947 British Amateur over Dick Chapman. Turnesa served on three winning Walker Cup teams, 1947, ‘48 and ’51. More than a golfer, Turnesa served as president of both the MGA and the NYSGA and co-founded the Westchester Caddie Scholarship Fund.

Willie Turnesa of Elmsford won the 1938 NYS Men's Amateur and U.S. Amateur titles, and captured a secon U.S. Am title in 1948 over Ray Billows.

Winged Foot’s Chapman was once described by Time magazine as the “Ben Hogan of amateur golf” for his extraordinary play. While Chapman won the 1939 NYSGA Amateur Championship at Siwanoy, he focused most of his competitive attention at the national level. Chapman earned an amateur record 19 Masters invitations and won an unmatched collection of national titles, including the British, French, Canadian and Italian amateurs. 

Rochester’s Sam Urzetta played basketball at St. Bonaventure University in the late ‘40s, leading the nation in free-throw percentage. He was also a pretty good golfer. Urzetta won the 1948 NYSGA Amateur and, in 1950, took the U.S. Amateur over Frank Stranahan, generally considered the decade’s best amateur. Urzetta played on the 1951 and ’53 U.S. Walker Cup teams with fellow New Yorkers Chapman and Willie Turnesa before turning professional.

As it turned out, this was the start of a Golden Age of New York Amateur Golf, which would extend for at least another decade. 

Sam Urzetta of Rochester won the 1948 NYS Men's Amateur and the 1950 U.S. Amateur title.

A Five-Peat

Where the men had several strong players, the women needed only one. Ruth Torgerson, a lawyer from Garden City, established herself as New York State’s dominant woman golfer of the 1940s. Torgerson, who didn’t take up the game until 1928 when she was just out of her teens, soon became a local force. In 1934, she won her first of five Long Island Women’s Amateurs.

Moving into the 1940s, Torgerson took the MGA’s Women’s Amateur three times. In 1949, she put on the Empire State’s unofficial triple crown, capturing the MGA, Long Island and NYSGA women’s titles all in one season

Playing the kind of golf that made her New York’s most feared woman golfer, Torgerson claimed her first New York State Women’s Amateur Championship title in 1946 at her home course, the Cherry Valley Club. She successfully defended in 1947 at Leewood, then followed that with three more consecutive NYSGA championship titles, compiling a “five-peat” that stands to this day as a NYSGA record.

Despite what could have been a “I have conquered this world, what’s next?” Torgerson continued to compete well, finishing her NYSGA tour de force with the 1960 and ’61 Women’s State Senior championships.

Ruth Torgerson of Cherry Valley, five-time winner of the NYS Women's Amateur and two-time winner of the NYS Women's Senior

Familiar Faces:

• In 1940 and 1942, Doug Ford won the NYS Boys’ Junior Amateur Championship at Sleepy Hollow and Briar Hills, respectively. Ford, from Harrison, would later turn professional and capture the 1955 PGA Championship and the 1957 Masters. He was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame. 

• Leroy C. Crim of Binghamton, won the inaugural NYS Men’s Senior Amateur at Onondaga. One of the NYSGA’s most supportive clubs, the Syracuse club was the inaugural host of the following NYSGA championships: NYS Open (1928), Boys' Junior (1931), and Men’s Senior (1940).

• Virginia Guilfoil Allen of Syracuse claimed the 1941 Women’s Amateur title at Siwanoy CC. She was also the daughter of Oscar Guilfoil, who served as NYSGA President from 1950-52. During his presidency,  the USGA complained about lack of cooperation and he headed a committee that brought the state body into line. For his efforts, he was awarded a gold medal.

• Dick Mayer, the 1947 NYSGA Men’s Amateur champion who became a Winged Foot professional, was a part of the 1954 U.S. Open drama at New Jersey’s Baltusrol. This first-ever televised USGA event found Mayer and Ed Furgol — who grew up in New York Mills — tied going into the 72nd hole. Mayer’s charitable double-bogey 7 handed Furgol his first and ultimately only major championship. He later came back to win the U.S. Open in 1957, when he beat defending champion Cary Middlecoff in an 18-hole playoff at Inverness to win his only major.

  Dick Mayer of Winged Foot won the 1947 NYS Men's Am, (left) and Doug Ford of Harrison won the NYS Boys' Junior twice in 1940 and 1942.