Golf and television
Sports and TV have become inextricably linked through the years. As recently as 1946, fans were still providing their own images to the dramatic radio broadcast of the 1946 World Series.
Baseball proved to be perfect for a new tube technology that beamed rays of hypnotic light into everyone's home. But golf presented many unique challenges to television coverage. Aside from playing on 150 acres as opposed to being surrounded by fences at a distance of 400 feet from home plate, there was constant, ongoing action with many athletes competing independently at any given moment. What's a broadcaster to do?
Keep it simple — and they did. The first broadcast of a golf event was the renowned Tarn O'Shanter Classic from Chicago on Sunday, August 22, 1953. One camera fixed on the 18th hole. Perhaps as an indication of the excitement that golf would eventually bring to the tube, the moment for this particular coverage was opportune. Lew Worsham, a modestly successful pro, approached the 18th not unlike many finishing holes that year, but the difference this time was that this shot would yield an often sought, but not often produced, result: a hole-in-one. If you're interested, the videotape of that monumental moment is available in the game's video archives.
It was the unbridled charisma of one man that turned the nation's attention to the sport of captains and kings. Arnold Palmer, of the hitch-and-smile, go-for-broke style and unwavering charm, turned the viewing world on its ear and kept viewers glued to their sets. In 1960, Palmer began carrying an industry on his back as golf and television developed together to provide a foundation for a sport that would ultimately reap immense rewards in the great sports and television-rights derby.
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