Don't Ask What I Shot

Imagine the rumpus if Dwight Eisenhower was bowling when some international calamity cropped up. In his two terms as president ... spanning 1953 to 1961 ... he was usually on the golf course when they did. Better to receive heavy news in spikes than in three-tone bowling shoes. In Catherine Lewis' revealing new book, "Don't Ask What I Shot: How Eisenhower's Love of Golf Helped Shape 1950's America," the Atlanta-based golf historian and Kennesaw State University professor tells an intimate story about a president's public obsession ... an obsession so passionate that at times you wonder if he cared what America thought about how he spent his time in office, and out of it. Eisenhower cared what America thought. Golf addicts, though, can't help themselves. The 1950s was a time when an average American didn't know what their president was doing every minute. We do today, whether we like it or not, and seeing presidents in jogging togs or delivering insignificant speeches they've been pressured to deliver just ain't that inspiring. Eisenhower played golf nearly eight hundred times while he was in office. He was the first president to have a putting green installed on the grounds of the White House. It wasn't his idea ... it was the USGA's ... but Eisenhower saw its completion a little over a year after he was sworn in the first time. Eisenhower played at the nation's most exclusive golf and country clubs. Most of the time he was seen, and even photographed, with a golf club in his hand. He recuperated from heart attacks by playing golf. He had some golf pals named Snead and Hogan. Jones. Like everyone else he snuck out of the office to whack nuts ... even though it was the oval one ... and amazingly he always came back to an afternoon and evening of appointments less agitated. He was already a member of Augusta National Golf Club before his first term and made twenty-nine trips to his club during his two terms, sporting a handicap between 14 and 18. He broke 80 four times in his eight years as president. He paid dues to Augusta National Golf Club like every other member. He had a big pine tree on the 17th hole named after him. A cabin, too. His addiction was constantly fueled. Lewis eloquently tells us that America's attitude toward their golf nut president was positive when things were swell. During his presidency, the birth control pill was introduced. Polyester was invented. Sputnik got him feeling competitive. He still did something he loved ... a lot ... when things weren't so swell in 1950's America, but it wasn't scandalous. Chasing a golf ball wasn't impeachable. But his magnificent addiction made more Americans aware of the sport, however ambivalent they were about why a man chases a golf ball. Then Arnold Palmer came along and gave the sport a working man's face ... and Eisenhower and Palmer became good friends. The president proved you didn't have to be good at golf to enjoy it. You really didn't have to know