📍Latrobe, PA 15650, USA
1929 – 1954“I was born in Latrobe, a steel and coal town in the hills of western Pennsylvania, in September 1929, and I grew up in a modest house beside the fifth hole of Latrobe Country Club. My father, Milfred Palmer, whom everyone called Deacon, was the club's greenkeeper, and from 1932 its golf professional too, and my mother, Doris, kept the books and the household money. From about the age of three I went to work with my father, riding on his tractor as he mowed the course. Pop cut down a set of clubs to my size and taught me to grip and swing when I was four, and he never let me change it. As the pro's son, I wasn't allowed to play the course when members were there, so I played early in the morning and late in the evening, and I couldn't go in the clubhouse. At eight I'd wait by the water hole and, for a nickel, hit balls over the ditch for ladies who couldn't carry it. Pop was a tough, demanding man who also worked nights in the steel mill to make ends meet, and he taught me to hit it hard, play the game honestly and treat everyone the same. At Latrobe High School I was too small for football, but I led the golf team and won local titles. I went to Wake Forest, served in the Coast Guard, and won the US Amateur in 1954. Then came seven majors and Arnie's Army. I came home to Latrobe all my life, eventually buying the club where my father had worked, and the town's airport now bears my name.”
🗺️ Approximate location today
📍 Street view today