One of the sport's great optimists

As a postscript to the US Open, officials talked with amusement of some rather quirky entries from players desperate to compete for the blue riband of American golf. But according to Larry Adamson, the USGA's director of championship administration, none could seriously rival an audacious aspirant whose application still stands apart from all others.

Henry J Brown wrote to the USGA explaining that he couldn't compete in normal qualifying because of circumstances beyond his control. Those circumstances happened to be the fact that he was a guest of the State of Georgia - in Augusta's city jail.

Undaunted, Brown suggested that the USGA executive director should come down to Augusta, get him out of jail and then arrange a special, 36-hole qualifier in which he (the USGA man) would act as marker. And the applicant promised he would dazzle the official with birdies.

The request, in 1980, never reached the top man. As with all good bureaucracies, it was fielded by Adamson who wrote back with the bad news. But Brown, who was in jail for failure to make alimony payments, was undaunted. In a phone call to Adamson he suggested: "If you set up this (qualifier) for me, you can even handcuff me between shots."

Two years later and now a free man, Brown officially entered for the 1982 US Open. Aware of what had happened to their brethren in the Royal and Ancient, USGA officials were understandably sceptical. They remembered how a certain mail sorter named Walter Danecki from Milwaukee, had entered the British Open at Royal Birkdale.

Insofar as he intended to compete for a share of the prize fund of £12,500, Danecki thought it only proper to describe himself as a professional, though his only experience was a few rounds on a local municipal course. In the event, he shot 108 in the first qualifying round at Hillside and refused to quit.

The R and A had no choice but to allow him to continue and he proceeded to shoot a second round of 113 to miss qualifying by a mere 75 strokes. Whereupon he commented: "I'm glad I played your small ball. If I'd played the big ball, I'd have been all over the place."

Then there was the case of English crane driver Maurice Flitcroft, who shot a first round of 121 in qualifying at Formby for the 1976 British Open, again at Birkdale. This time, the R and A were greatly relieved when Flitcroft withdrew with the parting words: "I've made a lot of progress over the last few months." He would return, however, as "Gerald Hoppy" from Switzerland for the 1983 Open, but was turned off the course after shooting a front nine of 63 at Pleasington.

In the event, though Brown may have been a jailbird, he was way above that league. In fact the 42-year-old turned quite a few heads by tying for medallist honours in a local qualifying round in South Bend, Indiana. From there, the player with a cross-handed grip who practised in a car junkyard, went on to miss out by only a stroke in sectional qualifying in Chicago.

It later transpired that he had caddied for Roberto de Vicenzo when the Argentinean missed out on a play-off for the 1968 Masters after signing for a four where he had a three. Up to his death from cancer in 1993, Brown maintained a telephone friendship with Adamson. As he said on one occasion: "Mr Larry, all I ever wanted was a chance."

"We drank a little champagne out of the cup. It still feels good and I expect this to feel good for a long time." Payne Stewart 24 hours after his US Open triumph at Pinehurst.

A man called horse, Anthony Horse, had the misfortune to be standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. At least that's the way it appeared when a dead, 30-foot pine tree fell on him, on the 12th hole of the former Fort Devens GC in Ayer, Massachusetts. As it happened, Horse was working at the former US army base and injured his shoulder badly enough to require helicopter transport to a nearby hospital.

That was in May 1993. And Horse proceeded to take a $1 million lawsuit against the US government, who were owners of the course, saying that it should have known the tree was a potential danger and therefore they should have removed it before it fell.

When the case came to court recently, it was in progress two days when the parties agreed a settlement - for $375,000 Since the incident, the course was closed and a federal prison and hospital have been built on the site. And Horse? According to Boston newspaper reports, he now plays one-armed golf and shoots in the nineties.

Matt Kuchar, the sweet-smiling 1997 US amateur champion, was 21 last Monday. And his parents gave him a rather handsome birth- day present, which would have done much to ease the pain of missing the halfway cut in the US Open three days previously. Valued in the US at $41,000, it was a Mercedes ML 320 sports car with the Florida licence plate "THE KUCH." How's that for mum and apple pie!

I had always been intrigued by a photograph in the splendid book Himself of Christy O'Connor Snr in gamekeeper's attire and carrying what appeared to be a metal wood. It was only en route to Pinehurst that I discovered the background to the photo while reading Not Only Golf, the autobiography of that prince of golf writers, Pat Ward Thomas.

It was taken in 1964 at Westward Ho!, on the occasion of the club's centenary, when a contest was staged between O'Connor and Max Faulkner, with ancient dress and equipment, and Peter Alliss and Brian Huggett in modern attire. According to the author: "The `ancients' wore Norfolk jackets and breeches with deerstalker hats."

He went on: "Faulkner cut a dashing, somewhat Sir Jasperish figure, while O'Connor resembled an amiable poacher in his Sunday best. Each had five clubs - driver, iron, mashieniblick, niblick and a wooden-headed putter. Soon the old sharp click of the gutty ball was heard when Faulkner opened the proceedings, but O'Connor was soon to be the hero.

"His fine, free swing and natural genius for the game were well suited to hickory clubs. He gave a marvellous exhibition of strokes - faded, drawn, flighted high and low - with a real museum piece of a driver. Its aluminium head weighing eight ounces, had a leather-faced inset. The club felt astonishingly light, but O'Connor rarely mis-hit.

"He was round in 83 in a fresh wind on a difficult course he had never seen before. He and Faulkner, who received strokes on 12 holes, greatly enjoyed themselves, especially when O'Connor holed a pitch of some 35 yards over the stream at the 18th to win the match."

Those of us who considered all the talk during the US Open about the prospective Mickelson baby to be some- what overplayed, were wrong. The fact is that a healthy 7lbs 4oz baby girl, Amanda Brynn, was born to the player's wife Amy on Monday.

Apparently Amy went into labour at 3.00.m. Arizona time. Which raises all sorts of intriguing possibilities insofar as the timing would have coincided with the half-way point in an 18 hole play-off - had it become necessary. Which, as we all know, was an extremely close-run thing.

It will be recalled that Mickelson led Payne Stewart by one stroke with three holes to play and that they were level after the 16th which the left- hander bogeyed. And after a birdie on the 17th, it took a glorious pitch-and-putt par on the last, to give Stewart the title. Would Amy have pressed the beeper to summon her husband home? Is Mickelson now happy that Stewart sank the winning putt? Will the possibility of a conceded title make the USGA re-think their stubborn, play-off procedure? Will Amanda Brynn play golf right-handed or left-handed? Better than Eastenders isn't it?

This day in golf history . . . . . On June 26th, 1955, Patty Berg won the fifth of her eight Women's Western Open victories at Maple Bluff CC, Wisconsin. She captured a total of six tournaments that year, the others being the Titleholders Championship, All-American Open, World Championship, St Petersburg Open and the Clock Open. In 17 tournaments for the season, her stroke average was 74.83.

Teaser: In fourball play, A is preparing to play from off the putting green. B, A's partner, attends the flagstick without A's knowledge or express authority. A plays and his ball strikes B or the flagstick. What is the ruling?

Answer: If the flagstick is attended by the player's caddie, his partner or his partner's caddie, i.e. by a member of the player's side, it is deemed to be attended with the player's knowledge and authority. Accordingly, under Rule 17-3, A incurs a penalty of loss of hole in matchplay or two strokes in strokeplay. In strokeplay, A must play the ball as it lies. B incurs no penalty.