It’s been quite a week. The country is dividing into two sides, as it usually does, this time over the indictment of a former president. But luckily, because of the wisdom of a late historian at Augusta College (as it then was), that won’t touch me or my community. For a few days at least.
The indictment is an interesting story. No president has ever been indicted, although a couple have come very, very, close. Certainly, Mr. Nixon was in some jeopardy before Mr. Ford issued the pardon. (Wisely, in my humble opinion. But that is neither here nor there.) The current indictment concerns events that preceded his presidency, for which immunity does not exist. This case might attract almost as much attention as the OJ case did.
But not here, not at this time.
Once again, Augusta is about to host the Masters Tournament. The Augusta National Golf Club will be a world center, drawing attention from many other athletic and non-sports events. And I all became a part of this because 32 years ago, Dr. Ed Cashin chose me as the next person to be interviewed for an opening on the Augusta College history faculty. It was a good example of luck playing a role in life. For various reasons, two other candidates had fallen through, and Ed called me. I missed my one chance, by the way, to stay at the Partridge Inn; the reservation had gotten messed up, so I wound up staying at his house. Not the most relaxing thing for an interviewee to do, but it all ended well, and I spent 30 years historicizing on the Hill. I even spent eight years fulfilling Ed’s former function as department chair.
But back to the Masters. When I got the job, I started calling my very spread out family to let them know. My sister Alexandra, who lives in Ireland, had heard of the Masters. My late brother in law in Canada, Hugh, an avid golfer himself, was very familiar with the Masters. All of my friends of knew about the Masters. In fact, there was only one person who had never heard of the sacred tournament.
Me.
This came back to haunt me years later, when I got a practice rounds ticket and Hugh, so excited that I had been, asked me if I had seen this person, that person, etc., and all I could say was “I dunno. I saw a bunch of guys playing golf …” I’m sure I fell in his estimation. But to give you an idea of the reach of this game; Hugh was a doctor, and one of his very seriously ill patients requested a Masters cap. It means that much to so many (and I was able to get one).
Of course, the whole event is more than game. Our city gets cleaned up and organized on a level not seen for the 51 other weeks. Thousands of Augustans earn money from the tournament, including me – for five years I lived close enough to sell parking in my yard. The network aerial camera intros do a splendid job of making the club look as if it is a giant estate in the country; nobody needs to know that it is bounded by a cemetery at one end and a not especially attractive part of Washington Road on the other. Truly, we create a Potemkin Village for the world.
And what is that, you may ask? Short version; A Russian Prince Potemkin was accused of having built false-front villages to make his subjects believe things were better than they really were. The cleanup, the repairs, etc., etc., do make it look like we are a much better run and much better functioning city than we really are. More to the point, we look our best and function the smoothest when the decisions are effectively made by a small but immensely powerful and wealthy organization – the Augusta National Golf Club. That aspect of the tournament should give us pause.
But it does bring us together. Even if we have no direct connections to the Club or the Tournament, it is still “ours.” Neither the travails of an ex-president nor any other crisis will absorb our attention this week. Fascist, conservative, liberal and Communist Augustans can all discuss the Leaderboard, the latest tricks of the grounds designers, and the fortunes and misfortunes of the golfers. For one week a year, we are a unified whole.
And it’s the only golf tournament I watch all year.
