PGA Tour Four-Ball team event

Ben Hogan and Jimmy Demaret were the odd couple. Hogan was cold and calculating, dour on his most pleasant days, his focus never wavering from unattainable perfection. was the life of the party and golf’s goodwill ambassador. Damaret had few acquaintances, but thousands of close friends. Hogan may, or may not, have been among them, but on the golf course they formed one of the most successful teams in American golf during an era when four ball competitions were staples on the PGA Tour schedule.

The best known of the four-ball competitions were in Miami, Florida and in Toledo at the Inverness Club. The Hogan-Demaret team won the Miami tournament five times and were champions of the Inverness event four times. The Inverness Four-ball Invitational was a grind. Teams played as many as 126 holes, over four days. But, the week of the Inverness Invitational was also one of the most anticipated of the year by Toledo’s sports fans.

The invitations were sent to the best players on tour and, for almost two decades minus the war years, the best in the game appeared in Toledo.

Perhaps, no player’s arrival, however, was more anticipated than that of Byron Nelson in 1939 because just weeks earlier he had signed a contract to become the head professional at Inverness Club for the 1940 season.

In 1949, the Inverness Club’s most famous member, Frank Stranahan, became the only amateur to ever play in the Four-Ball Invitational teaming with Demaret, he stood in for Ben Hogan who had been seriously injured in an auto accident the previous winter.  

PGA Tour Four-Ball team event
1935 - Bobby Cruickshank-Tommy Armour
1936 - Ky Lafoon-Walter Hagen
1937 - Horton Smith-Harry Cooper
1938 - Sam Snead-Vic Ghezzi
1939 - Henry Picard-Johnny Revolta
1940 - Ralph Guldahl-Sam Snead
1941 - Ben Hogan-Jimmy Demaret
1942 - Lawson Little-Lloyd Mangrum
(1943-45 – No event, World War II)
1946 - Ben Hogan-Jimmy Demaret
1947 - Ben Hogan-Jimmy Demaret
1948 - Ben Hogan-Jimmy Demaret
1949 - Bob Hamilton-Chick Harbert
1950 - Sam Snead-Jim Ferrier
1951 - Henry Ransom-Roberto de Vicenzo
1952 - Sam Snead-Jim Ferrier

PGA Tour medal-play event
1953 - Jack Burke, Jr.