Tom Morris, Jr.

Young Tom Morris wearing the Championship Belt

Grave memorial, St Andrews, Fife

Tom Morris, Jr. (20 April 1851 – 25 December 1875) otherwise known as "Young Tom Morris" was one of the pioneers of professional golf.

He was born in "The Home of Golf", St Andrews, Fife, Scotland, and died on Christmas Day, 1875 at the age of twenty-four. His father, Old Tom Morris, was the greenskeeper of the St Andrews Links and had won four of the first eight Open Championships.

For many years it was thought on the basis of a baptismal certificate that Morris was born on 10 May, 1851, but in 2006 his birth certificate was discovered at New Register House in Edinburgh, Scotland. The announcement was made by Peter Lewis of the British Golf Museum on behalf of a friend who discovered the certificate while carrying out research for a book on the Morris family. ^[1]

"Young Tom" won the Open Championship in 1868, 1869, 1870 and 1872. In 1868, Young Tom scored the first recorded hole in one of the Open Championships on the 8th hole at Prestwick. [1]In 1869 his father finished second to him, a unique family occurrence in the Championship. Young Tom was allowed to keep the original Championship Belt after his hat-trick of victories, so the famous Claret Jug was purchased for the next tournament in 1872, and his became the first name to be engraved on it.

He toured Scotland and parts of England with fellow golfer David Strath playing exhibition matches.[2]

In a match play in September 1875 between Old and Young Tom and Willie and Mungo Park, Young Tom received a telegram that his pregnant wife, Jean Finley, had suddenly got very sick. Old Tom and Young Tom hurried home but when Young Tom got there his wife and newborn baby were dead. Young Tom never got over this, and he died on Christmas day the same year.

References

1. ^ Notes: Young Tom Morris gets 20 days older, pgatour.com, 1 August, 2006.

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