Louis Tellier: Early Tour Golfer Killed Self on Course

Louis Tellier was a French golfer who emigrated to the United States in the mid-1910s. Although he won no big tournaments in France, the French Golf Federation calls him "one of the most important French golfers of the early 20th century." That's because Tellier was the first golfer from France to win in America on the circuit that grew into the modern PGA Tour. Tragically, Tellier took his own life at age 35, dying on the Boston-area golf course where he was the head pro.

Full name: Louis Emile Auguste Tellier

Date of birth: November 2, 1886

Place of birth: Versailles, France

Date and place of death: November 3, 1921, in West Newton, Massachusetts

Nickname: After moving to the U.S., "Frenchie."

His Biggest Wins

• 1920 New England Pro Championship
• 1921 Massachusetts Open

In the Majors

Louis Tellier first traveled to the United States to play in the 1913 U.S. Open. He sailed with the much more-famous English pair of Harry Vardon and Ted Ray, both of whom wound up in the storied playoff at that Open that was won by 20-year-old American amateur Francis Ouimet.

In the final round, Tellier played his front nine in 35 strokes — a very strong score on the day — and found himself in the tournament lead by three strokes. But a slip on the tee of the 12th hole led to a bogey-6, and several more bogeys down the stretch snatched away his chances. He finished tied for fourth place.

But Tellier did achieve the distinction that year of being the first golfer from France to play in any U.S. Open.

He had several other Top 10 finishes in majors. He came eighth in the 1914 U.S. Open. In the 1915 U.S. Open, Tellier shared the lead after two rounds, but then scored 76-79 and again tied for fourth. He also tied fifth in the 1919 U.S. Open. In seven total U.S. Open appearances from 1913 to 1921, Tellier finished lower than 14th just once.

He tied for fifth in the match-play 1920 PGA Championship, losing in the quarterfinals to the eventual winner, Jock Hutchison.

Tellier also played the British Open twice, first in 1911 (missed cut) and again in 1913 (tied 22nd).

More About Louis Tellier

In his book The Greatest Game Ever Played (affiliate link), about that 1913 U.S. Open, author Mark Frost described Louis Tellier as "a small, natty, personable character, with a delightful tendency to mangle his English."

Tellier stood just 5-foot-2 inches and was often referred to in the American newspapers of his time as "the little Frenchman" or "the diminutive Frenchman."

He grew up near one of the top golf courses in France, La Boulie in the Versailles section of Paris. In his teens he met the British golfer Wilfred Reid, himself just a teenager but already the pro at La Boulie. Tellier would wind up becoming the brother-in-law of Reid (and Arthur Reid, another pro), later marrying Elizabeth Ella Reid.

By 1906, at age 19, Tellier was working as Reid's assistant at La Boulie, and played that year in the very first French Open. He made his major championship debut in 1911, at age 25, in the British Open.

In 1913, a squad of four French golfers took on a team of four American golfers in a match that included both foursomes and singles match play. Tellier was joined on the French side by Arnaud Massy, Jean Gassiat and Eugene Lafitte, a quartet the media referred to as "the Four Musketeers."

The contest is referred to today as the France-United States Professional Match, and France won all six matches played. Tellier partnered Massy in a 3-and-2 foursomes victory over John McDermott/Tom McNamara. And Tellier defeated 2-time major champion Alex Smith in singles, 6 and 4.

A few months later Tellier sailed for America. And the trip, his first to the U.S., wasn't just about the U.S. Open. He arranged a series of exhibitions matches for himself to earn some money, and contacted many golf clubs in the Boston area hoping to hear of job openings.

American newspaper articles at the time sometimes referred to Tellier as a "French Open champion," or, more generally, as "the French champion." But, in fact, that's just because Tellier hyped himself up in introductory letters he wrote to American clubs before the trip. He had not won the French Open, nor any other major French golf tournament. (In his 1914 book Inland Golf (affiliate link), however, British major winner Ted Ray included Tellier with Massy and Gassiat as the best French golfers of the period.)

After playing in the 1913 U.S. Open, Tellier returned to France. But he stayed in his home country only another year, coming back to the United States in 1914 to become the head pro at Canoe Brook Country Club in New Jersey. In 1916, he took over as pro at The Country Club in Massachusetts, where he had finished fourth in the U.S. Open three years earlier. His final head professional job was at Brae Burn Country Club outside of Boston in Massachusetts, a position he assumed in 1919.

During his time as a club pro, Tellier, in 1916, was one of the inaugural PGA of America members, helping form the organization and being one of 35 pros who signed its charter. He also had a reputation as a fine instructor of the game, particularly after moving to Brae Burn.

That founding of the PGA of America in 1916 is also the moment to which the modern PGA Tour traces its origins. And PGA Tour statistics show Tellier playing in 24 tournaments that today are credited as official PGA Tour events.

In those 24 tournaments, Tellier had one win, one runner-up finish, two third-place finishes, seven total Top 5s and 12 total Top 10s.

In 1920, Tellier was in the Top 10 in seven out of the 10 events he played that are counted today as official PGA Tour starts. That included his only PGA Tour win, in the New England Pro Championship. Tellier scored 72 and 73 in the two rounds of the event, and his total of 145 was a new competitive course record at Wannamoisett Country Club in Rumford, Rhode Island.

Notably, that victory made Tellier the first golfer from France to win any tournament on American soil that today is counted as an official PGA Tour event (Massy's victory in the 1907 British Open is also retroactively recognized as a PGA Tour win, but obviously did not take place in the U.S.). There wasn't another win on the U.S. PGA Tour, in a tournament played in America, by a golfer born in France for more than 100 years, until Matthieu Pavon won the 2024 Farmers Insurance Open.

Tellier had another big win in 1921, in the Massachusetts Open, but that tournament is not counted today as an official PGA Tour event.

Tellier made another six starts on the PGA Tour in 1921. His final two official PGA Tour events resulted in a third-place finish in the Maine Open, and a second-place finish in the New England Open. Tellier was the leader in that New England Open after three rounds, but collapsed with an 85 in the final round.

The final round of that New England Open ended on October 17, 1921. Two weeks later, Tellier was dead.

Tellier's Suicide at Brae Burn

One day after his 35th birthday, Louis Tellier committed suicide by hanging. When his coworkers at Brae Burn Country Club that morning couldn't find him, they went looking for him.

"He was found hanging from the beam of a shelter located on the Brae Burn course," the French Golf Federation has stated. "Chronic depression related to his repeated failures in major (tournaments) is suggested by some as the explanation for his actions."

Depression and other mental health struggles were little understood at the time of Tellier's death in 1921, and very little was available then in terms of diagnosis or treatment. What, exactly, caused Tellier to take his own life will never be known.

Another contributing factor may have been the death three months earlier of his good friend J. Douglas Edgar. Edgar, a 2-time Canadian Open champ and runner-up in the 1920 PGA Championship, bled to death after being stabbed on the streets of Atlanta, Georgia, in August of 1921.

According to Steve Eubanks' book about Edgar, To Win and Die in Dixie (affiliate link), Tellier's wife "said that Louis had never come to terms with Edgar's death."

The author quoted a contemporary account in Canadian Golfer magazine, which stated, "Mrs. Tellier tells rather weird stories of how Tellier often imagined Doug was still with him and carried on conversations with him in a most animated manner."

There was extensive newspaper coverage in the United States of Tellier's death, with the media focusing on a series of health setbacks as a possible cause.

The Boston Globe, in an article with a sub-headline of "Ill-Health Believed by Friends to Have Caused Act," reported: "Friends of the little French golfer ... believe that he was mentally unbalanced from the effects of his recent illness and perhaps from two sunstrokes which he sustained last summer."

In the time of Spanish flu, the Globe reported that in October (a month before his death), Tellier had been "confined to his bed with a heavy cold." He played in the New England Open in mid-October despite not being fully recovered. Tellier finished the final round (the one in which he shot 85) drenched by rain. His "cold" worsened afterward, and he spent another week in bed.

About a week after that, Louis Tellier ended his life at age 35 on November 3, 1921.

Sources:
(Book titles are affiliate links; commissions earned)
Boston Globe. "Louis Tellier Ends Life at Brae-Burn," November 4, 1921.
Brenner, Morgan. The Majors of Golf, Volume 2, 2009, McFarland and Company.
Eubanks, Steve. To Win and Die in Dixie: The Birth of the Modern Golf Swing and the Mysterious Death of Its Creator, 2010, Random House Publishing Group.
Frost, Mark. The Greatest Game Ever Played: Harry Vardon, Francis Ouimet, and the Birth of Modern Golf, 2002, Hyperion Avenue.
McGuinness, D.J. "Rounds of 72 and 73 by Louis Tellier," Boston Globe, July 13, 1920.
McGuinness, D.J. "Louis Tellier Open Champion," Boston Globe, October 1, 1921.
Mazas, Alexandre. "The great French champions of yesteryear: Louis Tellier," French Golf Federation, April 30, 2020, https://www.ffgolf.org/parcours-detours/culture-golf/les-grands-champions-francais-de-jadis-louis-tellier.
PGA Tour. Players, Louis Tellier, Career and Results, https://www.pgatour.com/player/18979/louis-tellier/career.
Ray, Edward. Inland Golf, 1914, J. Pott & Co.