USGA too Honor Payne Stewart with 2014 Bob Jones...
USGA to Honor Payne Stewart with 2014 Bob Jones Award
Presentation to Loved ones Planned for 2014 U.S. Open Championship Week
As the game’s governing entire body fully commited to a longtime mission of preserving, marketing and celebrating the really greatest traditions and qualities of the recreation, the United States Golf Association (USGA) right now declared the late Payne Stewart as the recipient of the 2014 Bob Jones Award. Stewart will be honored in the course of a general public ceremony as element of the festivities bordering the 2014 U.S. Open Championship.
Introduced each year given that 1955, the Bob Jones Award is the USGA’s maximum honor. It recognizes an personal who demonstrates the spirit, private character and respect for the recreation exhibited by Jones, winner of nine USGA championships. Earlier recipients of the award contain several of golf’s very best champions like Francis Ouimet (1955), Babe Didrikson Zaharias (1957), Patty Berg (1963), Arnold Palmer (1971), Jack Nicklaus (1975), Ben Hogan (1976), Nancy Lopez (1998), Annika Sorenstam (2012) and Davis Really like III (2013), as effectively as other individuals who have contributed to the cloth of the recreation in other techniques, which includes Richard S. Tufts (1967), Joseph C. Dey Jr. (1977), Bing Crosby and Bob Hope (1978), P.J. Boatwright Jr. (1993) and President George H.W. Bush (2008).
Identified for his passion for golf, sportsmanship and philanthropy, Stewart received 11 skilled activities, which includes a few main championships, in the course of an 18-12 months PGA Tour occupation that was lower quick by a lethal airplane accident in 1999, four months right after his next U.S. Open victory. Stewart’s wife, Tracey, and their youngsters, Chelsea and Aaron, will be introduced with the USGA’s Bob Jones Award at a general public ceremony in the Village of Pinehurst in the course of U.S. Open week on Tuesday, June 10, at 5 p.m. EDT.
“We are so delighted, and know that Payne would be incredibly honored and humbled to be identified with the prestigious Bob Jones Award,” mentioned Tracey Stewart. “Payne beloved the recreation of golf and sought to dwell out and advertise the identical rules of large character, sportsmanship and passion that Bob Jones embodied. We are grateful to the USGA for honoring Payne in this sort of a great way.”
Stewart’s 18-foot par putt on the 72nd hole of the 1999 U.S. Open at Pinehurst offered a single of the championship’s most spectacular finishes. The celebratory minute is memorialized with a bronze statue of Stewart around the 18th inexperienced of Pinehurst No. 2.
“Payne’s legacy proceeds to shine as an inspiration to players of all ages,” mentioned Thomas J. O’Toole Jr., incoming USGA president. “His spirit and gracious perspective remaining an indelible mark on every person who surrounded him. His presence can nevertheless be felt by players who have been privileged adequate to engage in with him and by the junior golfers that his Payne Stewart Foundation proceeds to help.”
“Payne’s greater-than-existence persona created him a single of the most likable players by peers and supporters alike,” mentioned USGA Govt Director Mike Davis. “Payne’s energy of character showed by means of plainly in victory and defeat, which he personally knowledgeable in the U.S. Open. It is only fitting that we will make the presentation of this award to a two-time champion at the U.S. Open at Pinehurst in June for players and supporters to take pleasure in.”
“Payne was a single of the most partaking and dynamic players that I had the fortune to engage in with,” mentioned Peter Jacobsen, a USGA and PGA Tour champion and a single of Stewart’s closest pals. “He was an intensive competitor, but right after the previous putt dropped, he was warm and supportive, acquire or drop. That is the definition of sportsmanship and why I am glad to see the USGA honor Payne with the Bob Jones Award.”
Off the training course, Stewart donated his time and economic support to charitable initiatives that promoted the recreation and supported individuals in want. His legacy lives on in the Payne Stewart Foundation, fashioned by Payne and Tracey to train their youngsters about offering again to the local community. The Payne Stewart Foundation supports charities that target on youngsters in want, as effectively as the advancement of the recreation of golf. Given that 2007, the foundation has co-sponsored the American Junior Golf Association’s Payne Stewart Junior Championship.
“Payne Stewart personified the ideals of character, charity and sportsmanship, and is a worthy recipient of the USGA’s Bob Jones Award in the backyard of his biggest triumph,” mentioned PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem. “Because of the virtues he extolled, the once-a-year Payne Stewart Award was released by the PGA Tour in 2000 to pay out tribute, carry on his spirit and serve as a reminder of just how particular he was to us all. We are thrilled to see Payne obtaining more recognition for his contributions, the two on and off the golf training course.”
As the winner of the 1989 PGA Championship and the 1991 and 1999 U.S. Open championships, Stewart is a single of only eight players who have received at the very least two U.S. Opens and a PGA Championship. He was inducted into the Planet Golf Hall of Fame in 2001.
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