The entire team at National Links Trust joins the golf world in mourning the passing of Lee Elder, a pioneering giant of American golf.
Elder was an early member of the UGA Tour, where he had a dominant stretch winning 18 of 22 consecutive tournaments. He earned his PGA card in 1968, was the first Black golfer to play in the South African PGA Championship in 1971, the first to play in the Masters (1975), the first to qualify for play in the Ryder Cup (1979), and the first to share the exceedingly rare honor of being invited as an honorary starter at the Masters, where he teed it up with Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player in 2021.
Our mission at NLT, particularly at Langston Golf Course, is inspired by the courage Mr. Elder displayed throughout his life overcoming racial barriers and the animus he experienced as a Black man participating in an overwhelmingly white sport.
Barry Svrluga at The Washington Post recently wrote : “Elder’s connection to the nation’s capital, to Langston, is long and deep. He met his wife, Rose, at an event staged there by the all-Black United Golf Association. In the 1960s, he taught golf to Washington’s youth there. He played annually at the old Capital City Classic there. He began pursuing the idea of managing the facility in the early 1970s and was granted the right to do so in 1978….He saved Langston at a time when it might have wasted away into the Anacostia River.”
Winner of the USGA’s prestigious Bob Jones Award in 2019, which recognizes an individual who demonstrates the spirit, personal character and respect for the game exhibited by Jones, Lee Elder will be long remembered by all who love golf and appreciate the positive impact it can have on underrepresented communities everywhere.
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