photograph courtesy of ole miss athletics
Even when he was a teenager, golfers around Tennessee came to regard Middlecoff as the best local player any of them had ever seen. At age 17, he won the Memphis City Golf Championship (1938). He went on to win four consecutive Tennessee Amateur State Championships (1940-1943).
Golfer. Actor. Author. Commentator. Dentist. A Memphian through and through, Dr. Cary Middlecoff’s consistent demonstration of excellence in his chosen fields made him one of the city’s great ambassadors to the world.
“The Doctor” won the U.S. Open on two occasions (1949, 1956) and the Masters in 1955. He won more money on the Professional Golf Association (PGA) Tour than any other golfer during the 1950s. His 39 career tournament wins were good for fifth all-time until back trouble forced him to retire in 1963. Middlecoff’s win total is still good enough to rank him tenth all-time. As a commentator, he became one of the voices of the game for a younger generation of fans. A student of the game from an early age, he proved to be one of its greatest teachers too.
photograph courtesy of ole miss athletics
Emmett Cary Middlecoff was born on January 6, 1921, in the town of Halls, Tennessee, roughly 60 miles north of Memphis. His parents were Lucille and Herman Middlecoff, a dentist. Herman moved the family to Memphis when Cary was one month old to set up a local practice here, on the 16th floor of the Exchange Building. The elder Middlecoff was himself a golf enthusiast who won a number of local championships. He purchased his son a set of clubs for his seventh birthday and taught him the game.
Cary, as he already preferred to be called, proved to be an apt pupil. The links became the focal point of his free time. He was called “The Ghost” around Memphis for his apparition-like constant presence at every area golf course. Middlecoff grew into a powerfully built 6’2” man capable of driving the ball like few others. Even when he was a teenager, golfers around Tennessee came to regard Middlecoff as the best local player any of them had ever seen. At age 17, he won the Memphis City Golf Championship (1938). He went on to win four consecutive Tennessee Amateur State Championships (1940-1943).
During the 1949 season, Middlecoff became one of golf’s biggest stars, winning six tournaments including his first major, the U.S. Open.
After graduating from Christian Brothers High School, Middlecoff accepted a scholarship to play golf at the University of Mississippi, where he was an out-of-the-box success. In 1939, he became the first Ole Miss golfer to earn All-American honors. After graduating from Ole Miss, Middlecoff followed in his father’s footsteps.
In 1944, the younger Middlecoff graduated from the Tennessee School of Dentistry (now the University of Tennessee Health Science Center College of Dentistry). He then enlisted in the U.S. Army and spent the next two years plying his trade in the service, filling a reported 2,093 teeth. Upon his discharge, Middlecoff joined his father’s practice in Memphis while pursuing a professional golf career. The dentist/golfer took advantage of Army leave to compete in the North-South Open in Pinehurst, North Carolina, in 1945. The then-unknown golfer won the tournament, making him the first amateur to win the PGA event.
The surprising victory helped Middlecoff make up his mind about his future. “When I got out of the Army, I didn’t want to see any more teeth,” he apparently said in retrospect. In 1947, Cary became a full-time professional golfer. That same year, he married Edith Buck, an American Airlines flight attendant. The couple remained married for more than 50 years and were longtime members of the Christ United Methodist Church on Poplar Avenue in Memphis.
photograph courtesy of ole miss athletics
The Ole Miss golf team in 1939 included a young Cary Middlecoff, shown here in his senior year (third from the right).
Herman advised his son to give his professional golf career two years. If Cary failed to catch on, he should return to dentistry. Dentistry quickly faded into the rear-view mirror. During his first two years on the tour, Cary Middlecoff proved an immediate success, winning the Charlotte Open in 1947 and the Hawaiian Open and Miami International Four-Ball in 1948.
Stylistically, the young Middlecoff was noted for his consistency. Peers widely acknowledged the length of his drives but were even more impressed by how regularly he hit the fairway. Middlecoff rarely disappointed with long irons and is regarded as one of the best putters in tour history. At times, he annoyed other competitors with his slow, deliberate style of play but it is hard to argue with the results it produced.
In retirement, honors alone kept Middlecoff busy. In 1986, he was inducted into the PGA World Golf Hall of Fame. He was also honored with induction into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame, Ole Miss Hall of Fame, and Tennessee Golf Hall of Fame.
“One of the main reasons I took a lot of time over the ball was that I couldn’t see very well,” Middlecoff said of his tendency to take a long time to play. He was simultaneously plagued by hay fever while suffering from a left eye injury he sustained in the Army, and usually wore a visor on the course to shield his eye.
illustration courtesy of cbhs
This illustration, now on display at Christian Brothers High School, ran in local newspapers.
During the 1949 season, Middlecoff became one of golf’s biggest stars, winning six tournaments including his first major, the U.S. Open. After the first round, he sat six strokes behind the leader, Les Kennedy, at Medinah Country Club in suburban Chicago. “The Doctor” came roaring back in the second round, shooting a 67 that put him just one stroke out of the lead. On Saturday, Middlecoff edged his way into the lead and hung on Sunday afternoon, besting the legendary Sam Snead and Clayton Heafner by one stroke. The victory catapulted Middlecoff into the era’s pantheon of golfing greats alongside Snead and Ben Hogan.
Throughout the early 1950s, Middlecoff remained one of the Tour’s top golfers, winning at least three tournaments each year between 1950 and 1953 while finishing in the top 5 in annual earnings in each year. After a down 1954, Middlecoff turned in arguably the best year of his career in 1955, winning six tournaments and capturing the Masters. He dominated at Augusta National Golf Course, besting his closest competitor, Ben Hogan, by seven strokes to earn the green jacket.
At Oak Hill Country Club in Rochester, New York, Middlecoff won his third and final major in 1956, again holding off Ben Hogan on the final day to seal the victory. He also won the Vardon Trophy that season for lowest average score on tour. As his star rose ever higher, Middlecoff took advantage of the opportunity to pursue other interests.
photograph courtesy of cbhs
Cary Middlecoff’s personalized golf bag is on display at his alma mater, Christian Brothers High School.
Middlecoff began writing a regular golf advice column called “The Golf Doctor” for The Commercial Appeal that was nationally syndicated. “The Doctor” later compiled his insights into the mechanics of the game into The Golf Swing (1974), one of several books he co-authored on the subject. What makes The Golf Swing a particularly useful read for golf fans is the diversity of viewpoints articulated in the text. Middlecoff interviewed the likes of Ben Hogan, Arnold Palmer, and Jack Nicklaus for the book to talk about their respective approaches to the game. The Golf Swing offers one-stop shopping for readers interested in the way that the sport’s Golden Age greats approached the ball.
He appeared in other publications as well. “If there is a secret to golf, it is to know one’s capabilities,” he wrote in a 1955 golf advice column in Sports Illustrated. “Play within yourself, and you will be surprised how often the cup seems to come to you.”
“The Doctor” next tried his hand as an actor. Tall, dark, and handsome, Middlecoff’s suave and eloquence translated well to the big screen. Early in his career, he appeared in a short instructional documentary titled Golf Doctor (1947). In 1951, he played himself in Follow the Sun, a biographical picture starring Glenn Ford and Anne Baxter. In 1960, he appeared as himself alongside Jerry Lewis in a raucous comedy called The Bellboy. The film was Lewis’ directorial debut. Though Middlecoff skewed for the rest of his career toward television appearances, the experience made “the Doctor” a lifelong friend of the comedy legend. For years, Middlecoff endorsed a line of Jaymar men’s trousers tagged as “Cary Middlecoff slacks,” suitable for work, play, or leisure.
As Middlecoff approached his thirties, back trouble started to hamper him, a common struggle for taller players. Victories became fewer and further between. Competition on the tour also stiffened as younger stars like Arnold Palmer and Gary Player emerged from obscurity. Nevertheless, Middlecoff’s 28 tournament wins during the 1950s were the most of any player on the Tour. After the 1963 season, Middlecoff stopped appearing regularly on the circuit, playing only in the Masters through 1971 on his past champion’s exemption.
At the time of his retirement from professional golf, his career earnings were roughly $290,000. In later years, Middlecoff was quick to point out that some golfers earned that in a single tournament by the 1980s and 1990s.
Middlecoff spent much of the 1960s and 1970s in the broadcasting booth, serving as a golf commentator on NBC, CBS, and ABC at different times. Fans appreciated both his astute insights into the game and the ease with which he turned a compelling phrase. Commenting on the U.S. Open, Middlecoff famously said, “Nobody wins the Open. It wins you,” a concise explanation of the contingencies that stalk competitive golf. Middlecoff was far from immune to the stresses of the game. Like many of the game’s greats, he overcame nerves on the course to become one of the sport’s best purveyors.
Middlecoff could not be cajoled into playing on the Senior PGA Tour. Opportunities to continue playing professionally were abundant but he chose instead to lead a quieter life back home in Memphis. He and his wife, Edith, had no children but were active in their church and with family obligations. Middlecoff was a frequent presence at the Memphis Country Club, where he was known for his wit and great conversation.
photograph courtesy of mississippi sports hall of fame
Archie Manning, Johnny Vaught, Charlie Connerly, and Cary Middlecoff, circa 1970.
In retirement, honors alone kept Middlecoff busy. In 1986, he was inducted into the PGA World Golf Hall of Fame. He was also honored with induction into the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame, Ole Miss Hall of Fame, and Tennessee Golf Hall of Fame.
Middlecoff endured a series of debilitating health problems in later years. In 1993, he suffered a serious head injury from a fall at his Memphis home, preventing him from playing golf even casually in his final years. “The Doctor” died on September 1, 1998, of heart failure at Allen Morgan Health Center in Memphis. He was 77 years old. Three years later, Edith passed away. The couple is buried beneath a simple marker at Crittenden Memorial Park in nearby Marion, Arkansas.
Though Cary Middlecoff’s name does not appear in print or over the airwaves nearly as often as it used to, few denizens of the Bluff City have done as much as he did to spread its name to the world. Through a long public and private life, “The Doctor” represented the city with pride and dignity, adding to its esteem in all of his pursuits.
MOST CAREER VICTORIES ON PGA TOUR
(Through March 12, 2023)
1 — Tie: Sam Snead (82) and Tiger Woods (82)
3 — Jack Nicklaus (73)
4 — Ben Hogan (64)
5 — Arnold Palmer (62)
6 — Byron Nelson (52)
7 — Billy Casper (51)
8 — Tie: Walter Hagen (45) and Phil Mickelson (45)
10 — Tie: Cary Middlecoff (39) and Tom Watson (39)
Clayton Trutor teaches history at Norwich University in Vermont. He is the author of Loserville: How Professional Sports Remade Atlanta — and How Atlanta Remade Professional Sports (2022) and the forthcoming Boston Ball: Jim Calhoun, Rick Pitino, Gary Williams, and College Basketball’s Forgotten Cradle of Coaches (2023). Twitter: @ClaytonTrutor
