WGHOF Induction: O'Connor had impact on golf, Ireland

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Former President Dwight D. Eisenhower and golfers Christy O'Connor, Jose Maria Olazabal and Lanny Wadkins are being inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame on Monday. PGATOUR.COM has asked several prominent golfers and golfwriters to write essays about the inductees which we are publishing in the four days leading up to the ceremony at the World Golf Village in St. Augustine, Fla.

More often than not, a first name is all that's needed to identify one of golf's legendary figures. Think Arnie, Jack, Seve or Tiger.

Join GOLF CHANNEL host Rich Lerner on Nov. 2 at 10 p.m. ET to see the 2009 World Golf Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony presented by Shell. The coverage will also air on GOLF CHANNEL Nov. 3 at 3 a.m. ET, and Nov. 3 at 8 a.m. ET.

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Video: O'Connor's career

Then there's Ireland's Christy O'Connor, immediately identifiable by something as anonymous as the reflexive pronoun, Himself.

Dictionaries will tell you that the moniker is "chiefly Irish, a third party of some importance, esp. the master of the house: I'll mention it to himself."

It hardly does justice to the enormous influence of a true Irish folk hero, who will be inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in the Veterans category on Monday.

Born Patrick Christopher in the townland of Knocknacarra outside Galway City on Dec. 21, 1924, O'Connor's legacy to Irish and European golf is huge and tells a story far greater than any golfing statistic.

That said, he had 43 professional victories and set a record of 10 successive Ryder Cup appearances from 1955 to 1973 that was only beaten by Nick Faldo in 1997. He had ten top-10s in the (British) Open, won the Irish PGA 10 times and captured the World Cup (Canada Cup) with his great friend Harry Bradshaw in Mexico City in 1958.

O'Connor had an enormous impact on Irish life and it is no exaggeration to say that for a period of 20 years, from the 1950s into the '70s, he kept the country to the forefront of the international scene at a time when the country's sporting achievements were limited largely to the odd rugby victory.

It was at Galway Golf Club that O'Connor honed his skills with hickory-shafted clubs discarded by local professional Pat Quinn.

His favorite practice routine was to stand back from a tree and hit mid-iron shots around the right-hand side of it, then the left-hand and finally over it.

This taught him how to shape shots and gave him the swing that Lee Trevino said "flowed like fine wine."

It is a testament to his ball-striking that a teenage Padraig Harrington vividly remembers a freezing January afternoon spent at Royal Dublin, O'Connor's home for the past 50 years, when a chill wind whipped the sand around the marram grasses. It was a day when you wouldn't put a cat out.

"But Christy was out there hitting shots," said Harrington. "And they were beautiful shots. That's what fascinated me. Nobody in the world could have played those particular shots. He was hitting maybe 140-yard shots with a 6-iron and holding the ball onto the wind with a low draw. One after the other.

"Then he hit a few fades. And I don't think anybody could have played them as well as he was playing them on that occasion. It was just spectacular. And I kept reminding myself that here was a man in his 60s who actually had the will to go out there in those conditions, and hit those shots."

Editor's note: Brian Keogh is the golf correspondent for The Irish Sun. He also contributes to The Irish Times, Golf Digest Ireland, the Irish Independent, RTE Radio, Setanta Ireland, the Irish Examiner, Golf World, The Sunday Tribune, The Sunday Times and the Irish Daily Star.