ARNIE

One of the most original and embedded writers on the sport, Tom Callahan, will bring to bear his singing prose and his wealth of knowledge to craft the singular biography of one of golf’s most enduring heroes: Arnold Palmer.

In a sport, and in an era, that was slow and reluctant to change, the great Arnold Palmer built a bridge between the country club and the town square. The son of a greenskeeper, he entered the rarified realm of professional golf through the service entrance and became one of its most beloved players. With his frank, charismatic manner, he commenced a paradigm shift in golf from an elite, upper-class pastime to the democratic sport we know today. Photogenic and telegenic, Palmer, in his prime, became one of the first celebrity athletes this country has known; even people who hate golf love Arnold Palmer. In ARNIE, veteran golf journalist Tom Callahan will set out to write the first definitive biography of golf’s greatest player, seeking to tell the untold stories of a true American original, adored by so many. As Tom writes it, Arnie is philanthropic in the most literal sense of the word; throughout his career, he enjoyed being among the people, and found meaning in sharing his life with his fans. He wished to share golf with the world, hoping that those who excelled would pass the game along to those who didn’t know or didn’t care. The point was, for Arnie, was that every swing was a lesson in etiquette and in life. He’s written and responded to thousands of letters to fans over the years, and delights in the fact, Tom tells us, that his signature is worth so little in the market, as supply is so high. Of course, he wasn’t perfect. In Arnie, Callahan will explore his struggles as much as his strengths. He lost his first wife, Winnie, to ovarian cancer, and faced the disease in his own right. More than a few agitated husbands came after him throughout the years, as his love of women was, in a word, prolific. And, yes, he had his share of rivalries and disputes with his fellow players. However, more often than not, these conflicts ended in friendship. Tom’s access to Arnie, as well as the wealth of reporting he has gathered throughout the years, makes him a natural author of the definitive Arnold Palmer biography. Having reported on professional golf for over forty years, Callahan has reported on Arnie since his first time at the Masters in 1972. Later, at Golf Digest, Callahan wrote landmark “Arnie turns 70,” and “Arnie turns 80,” pieces, during which Arnie would tell Tom his life story in vivid detail. Only a small percentage of this material would go into his magazine features. As Callahan has inhabited this world for so long, his relationships are strong: he’s spoken to Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Sam Snead, Tom Watson and nearly everybody else about Arnie. Widely regarded as one of the best sports writers of a generation, Tom Callahan is the author of five books: His Father’s Son: Earl and Tiger Woods, The GM, In Search of Tiger, The Bases Were Loaded (and So Was I), and the New York Times bestseller Johnny U. A former senior writer at Time magazine, he was also the sports columnist for the Washington Post, and currently writes frequently for Golf Digest.