Arnold Palmer Invitational Still A Celebration of The King

Arnold Palmer may not be with us anymore, but the lasting legacy of The King will live on forever. There’s no better place to feel that than Bay Hill, his home away from home.

Everywhere you go this week at Bay Hill, there’s a reminder of Arnold Palmer, the legendary golfer, The King, and the man who created the tournament in 1979 as an outgrowth of the Florida Citrus Open, which started in 1966.

There’s the statue of Palmer by the first tee. There’s the signature bag on the range under a colorful Palmer umbrella, where players take their pictures next to it. There’s the Palmer signature, omnipresent, which is part of the tournament logo. And there’s the charity, Arnie’s Army, which continues to support the causes that were near and dear to Palmer when he was alive. But the story of how Palmer became the owner of Bay Hill is partly accidental.

The path to purchase was kind of like one of the Palmer quotes that decorates the media center this week: “The road to success is always under construction.”

In 1948, Palmer visited Florida with the Wake Forest golf team. At least that’s the way Palmer himself told it for the New York Times bestseller, A Life Well Played, an autobiographical book published in 2016.

His recollection of the area where Bay Hill is today was as a lovely location with “small-town atmosphere, the orange groves, the pristine lakes.”

The first Bay Hill course, designed by Dick Wilson, wasn’t completed until late in 1961. Central Florida was still just a little bit sleepy. Disney World was still on the drawing board and would not open for another 10 years.

Jack Nicklaus and a chance trip to Bay Hill changed the future for Arnold Palmer

In the winter of 1965, Palmer had been a pro for about 10 years. He had won the Masters four times, the U.S. Open once and the British Open twice. He and Jack Nicklaus were the biggest stars in golf. As it happened, Palmer, Nicklaus as well as Dave Ragan and amateur Don Cherry were invited to play an exhibition at Bay Hill.

Palmer admitted he was spurred to good play by having Nicklaus in the foursome. He birdied the first, third and fourth holes and eventually posted a 66. Nicklaus finished at 73. Afterward, Palmer could not get the golf course out of his mind.

At the time, the Palmers rented a home in Coral Gables for the winter, and after playing the exhibition, he returned there and told his wife Winnie that he wanted to buy the Bay Hill property. The problem was that, at the time, he didn’t have enough money.

It took another four years before Palmer could get a lease with an option to buy Bay Hill. In the interim, he won the Florida Citrus Open in 1971 on another course.

Three years later, the club was his. The grand plan was for the Palmers to spend summers in Latrobe, where they already owned Latrobe County Club, and winters in Orlando, where they owned Bay Hill.

After the purchase of Bay Hill was completed in 1974, it took another five years before the Florida Citrus Open became the Bay Hill Citrus Classic, in 1979.

By then Palmer had won 62 PGA Tour events. He was 50 years old. (His last PGA Tour victory had come at the Bob Hope Desert Classic in 1973.)

The tournament became the Arnold Palmer Invitational in 2007 and Palmer had his hand in all aspects, from players to sponsors to fans to media. He spent his time giving back to the fans and the game that had given him so much.

Arnold Palmer’s legacy lives on in today’s PGA TOUR stars

Palmer died in the fall of 2016, but all the players who continue to come to the Arnold Palmer Invitational revere the times they spent with the man who became known as The King.

“To be able to win this tournament and to have Arnold there and to shake his hand and for him to give me a big hug, and a couple times he says, ‘I called it, I knew you were going to make that putt,’ Tiger Woods recalled about his eight victories at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. “It was little things like that, the last sharing jokes with him out there on the green and he and I laughing, those are moment that is — unfortunately that I’ll never have– but I have those memories.”

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"“You knew you were meeting a legend, an icon,” Rickie Fowler said. “He’s always been that. I think his name obviously still does carry weight, it always will, it still has that presence, even with him not around.”"

Former champ Jason Day also had special Palmer memories.

"“When I first moved here, to the United States, I lived two minutes away and although I didn’t play a lot out here, coming out and watching Tiger one year after I missed the cut and watching from the spectators view, you just know that this golf course, this tournament itself is a big tournament for not only me but a lot of the players that are playing this week,” Day said. “So, saying that, being able to win it two years ago, having a drink with Mr. Palmer and being able to share that moment was special.”"

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The memories Palmer made with players and fans alike should insure that the tournament continues well into the future with Arnie’s Army Charitable Foundation carrying the banner for The King.

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