Pinehurst Magazine

Q: What are the most important aspects of a golf swing? A: If you can’t grip it right, you can’t swing. I have my glove marked with gripping the fingers. If the grip is wrong and you have this hand way under here, you have to see a knuckle or two here. You swing from the elbow down by turning. I used to ask [former golfing great] Babe Zaharias how she hit the ball so far. And she said, ‘Well, I just turn away and then I just swing it through.’ She picked up her left heel, but the first thing she did was slap that left heel back down. Q: How much has equipment changed in the last 50 years? A: They didn’t have wedges when I grew up. No sand wedges. We had to make more shots; we had to open up that 9-iron. If you could hit a 2-iron you were a super player. I remember bouncing balls on the cement to see how high they would bounce and I said ‘those are the ones we’re playing with.’ The ones that bounced higher were “hot balls” that went further. That’s how it was in the 1950s and ‘60s. Q: You signed an endorsement deal to promote Spalding products in 1950. How unique was that for the times? A: For Spalding to give me $10,000 and to pay my expenses was big money. There wasn’t a girl out there on Tour who got paid by a company, and nobody had names on their clubs. I remember telling them when I got married, and Spalding said ‘you’ve got to put Bell on there.’ Q: How many hole-in-ones do you have? A: Two. It’s still luck. Don’t tell me holein-ones aren’t luck. Some people skip them across the water and they go in the hole. Q: What makes you happy now? A: Watching my eight grandchildren play. All of my children played college golf. That’s important to their life. People that play the game enjoy life better. Pinehurstmagazine.com 15