Golfer Jock Hutchison: 2-Time Major Champ, Hall of Famer
Birth name: John Waters Hutchison
Date of birth: June 6, 1884
Place of birth: St. Andrews, Scotland
Date and place of death: September 27, 1977, in Evanston, Illinois
Also known as: Hutchison changed his name when he moved to the United States, using "Jack Falls Hutchison" or "John Falls Hutchison" as his full name on immigration and census documents. But everyone called him Jock, which is the nickname he went by. He was also nicknamed "Jovial Jock," which was much more about his off-course demeanor than his on-course disposition.
His Biggest Wins
- 1918 Florida West Coast Open
- 1920 West Baden Springs Hotel
- 1920 Illinois Open
- 1920 Western Open
- 1920 PGA Championship
- 1921 White Sulphur Springs Open
- 1921 British Open
- 1921 North and South Open
- 1922 Columbia Country Club Open
- 1922 Northern California Open
- 1923 Western Open
- 1925 Illinois PGA Championship
- 1926 Illinois PGA Championship
- 1928 Florida West Coast Open
He also won the Western Pennsylvania Open in 1909, 1910, 1913, 1914 and 1915.
As a senior (50+) golfer, Hutchison won two big national titles in the original senior major:
- 1937 Senior PGA Championship
- 1947 Senior PGA Championship
In the Professional Majors
Jock Hutchison was a two-time major championship winner who also had multiple other near-misses, including runner-up in the very first PGA Championship.
His 2 Wins in Majors
- 1920 PGA Championship: Hutchison's first major championship victory happened in the third-ever PGA Championship. En route to the title match, he beat Eddie Loos, Laurie Ayton, Louis Tellier and, in the semifinals, Harry Hampton. That set up a 36-hole championship match against J.D. Edgar. Hutchison led, 1-up, after the morning 18. And after the 27th hole, his lead was 3-up. Hutchison held on to win the match and the title, 1-up.
- 1921 British Open: Back home in St. Andrews, Scotland, Hutchison won this Open Championship in a 36-hole playoff against Roger Wethered. Hutchison led after the first and second rounds, but dropped to eighth after a 79 in the third round. In the fourth, he rebounded with the round of the day, a 70, and finished tied with Wethered, who was an amateur. Hutchison was in control of the playoff throughout. He led by three (74 to 77) after the first 18, and scored 76 to Wethered's 82 over the second 18. That gave Hutchison a nine-stroke playoff win, 150 to 159.
He nearly made two holes-in-one in a row in that 1921 Open. In the first round, Hutchison did ace the short No. 8 hole on The Old Course. Then he hit a drive of around 300 yards (lots of roll-out) on the ninth hole, his ball grazing the edge of the cup and stopping just three inches from the hole.
His Open victory was not without controversy, however, as he was playing with what was then called "ribbed" — deeply grooved — irons. The R&A had banned such grooves, but the rule went into effect on July 1, 1921, and Hutchison finished off his victory on June 25. That meant he was within the rules by one week — but there were many complaints from other golfers in the field about violating "the spirit of the game." (To be clear, however, Hutchison had every right to play those irons — he was within the rules that were in effect.)
His 3 Runners-Up and Other Major Finishes
- 1916 U.S. Open: Hutchison was runner-up in two majors in 1916, first in the U.S. Open. Here in the U.S. Open, Hutchison closed with a 68, the lowest final-round score to this point in U.S. Open history. His 288 set a tournament scoring record. But it only stood for about an hour, until amateur Chick Evans won with 286.
- 1916 PGA Championship: A couple months later, in the very first PGA Championship ever played, Hutchison reached the title match before falling, 1-down, to Jim Barnes. Hutchison led, 1-up, with three holes to play, but lost the final two holes. Hutchison beat Walter Hagen, 2-up, in the semifinals.
- 1920 U.S. Open: Hutchison was the first- and second-round leader, then dropped a shot off the lead after the third round. A 77 in Round 4 gave Hutchison four-way tie for second with Jack Burke Sr., Leo Diegel and Harry Vardon, one stroke behind the winner, Ted Ray.
All told, Hutchison recorded 17 Top 10 finishes in major championships, of which nine were Top 5 finishes.
In the U.S. Open (in addition to those already mentioned), Hutchison tied for fifth in 1911, tied for third in 1919, and was solo third in 1923. (In 1923 he was the second-round leader but had an 82 in the third round.)
In The Open Championship, he finished solo fourth in his title defense in 1922 (1921 and 1922 were the only times he played his native Open). Hutchison held a one-stroke lead following the third round, but a 76 in the final round left him two strokes short of Walter Hagen.
In the PGA Championship, Hutchison reached the quarterfinals in 1919, 1922 and 1928.
Ceremonial Starter at The Masters
In 1963, when Jock Hutchison was 79 years old, Bobby Jones made a request of him: Would he play a ceremonial drive from the No. 1 tee as a way of getting the 1963 Masters started? Jones also asked Fred McLeod to become what we now call "the Masters honorary starters."The tradition of honorary starters opening each year's Masters with ceremonial drives began that year of 1963. Hutchison and McLeod were the first two to do it, and they continued doing it together through the 1973 Masters. Hutchison turned 89 that year, and was unable to continue after 1973. (McLeod, a year older than Hutchison, hit the ceremonial opening drive through 1976.)
Many of their early years in the role, Hutchison and McLeod went ahead and played the full 18 holes. In 1965, for example, when both were in their 80s, they walked Augusta National in a full, 18-hole round that took them only 2 hours, 35 minutes to play. (They didn't keep score, but McLeod estimated both shot around 90.)
Why Hutchison and McLeod? How did they become the first two honorary starters at The Masters? The Senior PGA Championship was first played in 1937, and Hutchison won it. McLeod won it in 1938. Jones had helped create the tournament, and those first two years it was played at Augusta National. The 1963 Masters was the 25th anniversary of the last time the Senior PGA took place at Augusta National, so Jones invited those first two winners to begin the honorary starters tradition.
Coincidentally, Jock's great-nephew, Ralph Hutchison, spent several years (1932-35) as an assistant pro at Augusta National Golf Club, and golfed frequently with Jones during that time. Ralph later played in The Masters himself.
More About Jock Hutchison
The editors of a 1975 golf encyclopedia wrote of Jock Hutchison that he, "(w)ith Walter Hagen and Jim Barnes, ranked as America's finest player in the decade preceding the emergence of Bobby Jones." After the British Great Triumvirate, Hagen, Barnes and Hutchison were sometimes referred to as "the American Triumvirate" (even though two of them were actually born in Scotland). Then, in the early to mid-1920s, Jones began winning and became the singular focus.Donald Steel and Peter Ryde, the editors of that 1975 Encyclopedia of Golf, described Hutchison this way: "He was a nervous, talkative player, capable of great scoring bursts." And he "was a highly strung golfer who bounded forward after each shot. ... between shots he talked, chuckled, twiddled his thumbs and waved his arms to dry the perspiration that flowed freely. He had a theory for everything and was more than willing to discuss any aspect of the game."
Off the course, Hutchison was known as "Jovial Jock." Herbert Warren Wind called him "talkative, high-spirited, and a contagious chuckler."
But on the golf course, during play, Hutchison was, Wind wrote, "dourness itself and as nervous as a mosquito. He walked around restlessly between shots."
Born in St. Andrews, Scotland, in the 1880s, Hutchison played his first golf on The Old Course and by 1901 was caddying there.
He emigrated to the United States in 1904. Hutchison first settled in New York, where he worked at St. Andrews Club in Hastings-on-Hudson, and at New York Golf Club. His eighth place tie in the 1908 U.S. Open was his first appearance in a national tournament.
In 1909 Hutchison moved to Pennsylvania to become pro at Pittsburgh Golf Club, and in 1911 moved to nearby Allegheny Country Club. He became the dominant golfer in Western Pennsylvania, winning the Western Penn Open five times, first in 1909 and last in 1915.
By 1916, Hutchison was on the verge of a breakout nationally: He was runner-up that year in all three of the biggest professional tournaments then played in the United States: the U.S. Open, the Western Open and the PGA Championship.
During the interruption to the golf scene caused by World War I, Hutchison left Pittsburgh for Chicago. He won the National Patriotic Open tournament, played in place of the canceled U.S. Open, in 1917.
By 1918, Hutchison was pro at Chicago's Glen View Club, a position he held for 35 years until retiring in 1953.
After the war, Hutchison moved himself into that "American Triumvirate" conversation by winning four times on tour in 1920. Those victories included the PGA Championship and the Western Open, plus he was runner-up in the U.S. Open. In a three-week period, Hutchison won the Western Open by one over Barnes, Clarence Hackney and Harry Hampton; finished second to Ted Ray in the U.S. Open; then won the PGA Championship, beating J. Douglas Edgar in the final.
Hutchison also became a United States citizen in 1920.
His 1921 season was almost as good: He became the first American citizen to win the British Open, and had two other wins, including the North and South Open. Hutchison also had two second-place finishes: to Walter Hagen in the Western Open; and in the St. Joseph Open, where he lost a playoff to another diminutive Scotland native, Bobby Cruickshank.
In 1922, Cruickshank had two PGA Tour wins and was runner-up in the Western Open. His last big year was 1923, when he won the Western Open plus finished second three times in PGA Tour tournaments. But he did win three more times on tour after that, last in 1928.
PGA Tour records show Hutchison with 122 career tour starts. In addition to his 14 tour victories, he was second in 18 of those tournaments, third six times, had 52 Top 5 finishes and placed in the Top 10 in 72 of those 122 starts.
The first big, national senior golf tournament in America launched in 1937 with the creation of the Senior PGA Championship (then called the PGA Seniors' Championship). Hutchison, 53 years old, won it by eight strokes.
He also won the Senior PGA title in 1947. And he was runner-up five other times, including three playoff losses (1940, losing in a playoff to Otto Hackbarth; 1942; 1945; 1946, losing in playoff to Eddie Williams; and 1951, when, at age 67, Hutchison lost in a playoff to Al Watrous). And he finished third four other years. Overall, Hutchison played the Senior PGA Championship 25 times, with 12 Top 10 finishes.
Today Hutchison is a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, the PGA of America Hall of Fame, Illinois Golf Hall of Fame, Metropolitan PGA Hall of Fame, and Western Pennsylvania Golf Hall of Fame.
Hutchison was listed as a collaborator on the 1946 instructional book Golf Simplified.
He had an older brother, Tom Hutchison, who moved to America earlier than Jock did. Tom played out of Shinnecock Hills Golf Club and finished seventh in the 1900 U.S. Open. But injuries he suffered in an equestrian accident later in 1900 were fatal.
Sources:
(Book titles are affiliate links; commissions earned)
Illinois Golf Hall of Fame. Inductees, "Jock Hutchison Sr.," https://www.illinoisgolfhof.com/members/jock-hutchison-sr.
Litsky, Frank. "Two old masters go route again," New York Times, April 9, 1965, https://www.nytimes.com/1965/04/09/archives/two-old-masters-go-route-again-hutchison-80-and-mcleod-82-play.html.
PGA of America. PGA Championship Media Guide 2012, "1916 PGA Championship."
PGA of America. PGA Championship Media Guide 2012, "1920 PGA Championship."
PGA of America. Senior PGA Championship Media Guide, 2018, "Selected Player Records".
PGATour.com. Players, "Jock Hutchison," https://www.pgatour.com/player/15835/jock-hutchison.
Pittsburgh Post. "Brighton Greens Open," April 25, 1909.
Scharff, Robert. Golf Magazine's The Encyclopedia of Golf, 1970, Harper and Row.
Sommers, Robert T. Golf Anecdotes, 1995, Oxford University Press.
Steel, Donald, and Ryde, Peter. The Encyclopedia of Golf, 1975, The Viking Press.
TheOpen.com. "1921 / St. Andrews," https://www.theopen.com/previous-opens/56th-open-st-andrews-1921.
TheOpen.com. "Jock Hutchison," Bio, https://www.theopen.com/players/jock-hutchison.
Western Pennsylvania Golf Association. WPGA Open Championship, Past Champions, https://www.wpga.org/chp/cps/open/open-championship-champions-results.html.
Westin, David. "Hutchison's idea for announcers put him on the 18th," Augusta Chronicle, February 16, 2012, https://www.augusta.com/masters/story/history/2012-02-16/hutchisons-idea-announcers-put-him-18th.
World Golf Hall of Fame. Members, "Jock Hutchison," https://worldgolfhalloffame.org/jock-hutchison/.
