How Good Is Peter Thomson At Golf ACTUALLY?
Discover the untold story of Peter Thomson, the quiet Australian who turned golf into a game of strategy and calm precision. From humble beginnings in Melbourne to lifting the Claret Jug five times, Peter Thomson proved his greatness against legends like Jack Nicklaus and Arnold Palmer. This video explores how Peter Thomson rose above doubt, built a global legacy, and became one of the most overlooked champions in golf history.
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41 Comments
❤ Australian legend 🇦🇺
Great tribute mate, well done!!!!!
In his career he played and won against the best over decades from Bobby Locke, Norman von Nida to Hogan, Snead, Middlekof, Nicklaus, Palmer and Norman.
A few odd photos! One of Thomson playing left handed. Another identifying Arnold Palmer as him as well as one of Irish golfer, Christy O'Connor as him!
I am 80 now, he came back time and time again to the Grampians golf club near Dunkeld Victoria. He stated a couple of years before he died that our small country club was an example of the ongoing future of golf.
Swing looks so much like Hogan's.
I'm from Melbourne, I worked with his daughter Pan 1989/90 at the Mirage Country Club Port Douglas. My father was born 1927..I had a terrible round today, I only had 27 Stableford points. I've thought about him a lot lately.RIP Dad. Peter William Thomson AO, CBE (23 August 1929 – 20 June 2018) was an Australian professional golfer, often cited as the greatest and most successful golfer in Australian golf history. RIP Peter.
The photo at 40 seconds in IS NOT Peter Thomson.
If you really think he is Australia's greatest golfer with 5 Claret Jugs, even Greg Norman didn't win 5 Majors and he did…💯💯🙏👍👍
P:eter didnt like America and America didnt like Peter
five open championships is quite a feat, especially where it's played at a different course every year. I think tom Watson did it too.
the man is a legend.
And the clubs back then were not very good
I think Norman Von Nida was the first Australian to go to England
Hogan only went over once and won
He was very well liked in Japan as he got their game going
Lovely tribute, well done
No one needs to prove anything to America, that's a fact.
American golf didn’t like Thommo, it didn’t like Moe Norman, who does America golfers like?
And he never practiced….. 🤣🤣🤣🇦🇺 Australia 🇦🇺 produces the best players in the world. We always have. The problem is it’s Australia 🇦🇺.
In the late 1960’s dad took me to Darwin airport to get Peter Thompsons autograph.
I was about 10 – 11 years old
He gave me a putter !
I still remember it
Peter Thomson. Hero.
Wonderful, thank you.
There's a clip of Thomson at a reception before the 1970 Open at the Old Course, in which he says 'All golf courses, to some extent, are imitations of St Andrews, and hardly any of them come anywhere near it'.
What a fantastic, pitch perfect comment that was, from a very very clever and cultured man, one of golf's most brilliant ever players – two more Open wins than Jones, Nicklaus and Woods!
I LOVE how he went to America as a senior – not at 50 but in his mid 50s – and destroyed the lot of them until he'd made enough money to leave and enjoy the rest of his life.
PS The idea that most of his Open wins were against poorish opposition is demonstrable rubbish – Bobby Locke, for instance, easily beat the likes of Hogan and Snead when he played for a while in America, so much so that the tour rules were used unpleasantly against him, so he, with such admirable contempt, left them to it and moved to winning four Opens and countless other events around the world instead!
An elegant legend, quite rare
At Victoria GC where Thompson was a member, My dad as a young lad caddied for him a couple of times in the 50's. Dad got paid less than the cost of tram fare he took to get there. Even though, Dad always said Thompson had the best swing he ever saw.
I met Peter Thomson at Royal Lytham and St Annes at the 1974 Open. He was writing about the event, not a player, that year. I was a neophyte reporter, feeling my way and rather overawed. Thomson introduced himself to me, a 22-year-old nobody, and welcomed me to the fold. It was the act of a true gentleman and a very kind human being.
Is??? Do we mean was?
8 wins on the senior tour in 1985
Thomson was a classic Australian of the era, didn't make a big deal about his achievements. He even threw away clubs and balls that he hit famous shots with or won majors with. Never once heard him say "back in my day", however he would praise pretty much every golfer around him.
A true legend on and off the course, so I dont care if the US didnt like him, in fact I see it as an endorsement of his character.
He was an old mate of my dads, I only got meet him a handful of times but he was lovely each and every time. He gave me one of his old drivers when I was a kid, it was the first one he used that had a graphite shaft and a metal head, I wish I knew were it went.
I jokingly I said one day after we played at Moonah Links, that he must have been on crack the day he designed the course, he laughed at me and said no, not on that day…. 🤣
True talented gentleman unlike one certain USA president.
Just typical of American comment to downplay the success of others. Thompson would have smacked the arse of Americans in any case had they travelled to Scotland. Americans downplayed the contributions of Australians even, when they were strongest in tennis against all comers. Americans are sore losers and arrogant competitors.
Interestingly, Peer Thompson was one of the names behind starting Australia's abalone industry
I am proud to say, I was the last person to interview the great Man: it's on YT.
Humble Super Star.
In 1998, he was non-playing captain of the victorious International team in the President's Cup. The only victorious captain. A couple of his picks for the team were unexpected and unorthodox but were fully vindicated by the results. His quiet confidence and reputation clearly infected his team, the confidence of which never wavered and in a way it was his final great triumph.
In 1964 Peter played the Karrinyup Bowl tournament at Karrinyup Country Club in Western Australia. My mother was the head cook there and one time Peter came into the kitchen and asked my mother what did fellow golfer,
Masashi "Jumbo" Osaki order. When mum replied that he ordered steak and kidney pie, Peter said, "Don't give him that, it's the only food he can say in English, give him a porterhouse steak instead. Mum cooked the steak and she took it out herself worried that he would not like it. The smile on Jumbo's face said it all. Also, I was recovery from my second knee operation for osteo myelitis and I asked mum if she could get Peter's autograph for me. When I got the book back it had, what I think was, the autograph of every player at that tournament,
at least I have one thing in common with Peter Thomson; I also grew up playing Royal Park Golf Course. I used to live right opposite the then 4th, now 5th tee. I used to cross over the road and play 4, 1, 2, 3, and be back home. or 4,5,7, and be back home again. It is a 9 hole public course and to play all 9 you need to cross a train line and a tram track twice. In the days of old the 8th ran right alongside the Melbourne zoo, and a decent sliced drive might bounce off a hippo!. You could hear when the fed the lions.
Typical Yank pronouncing one of the oldest Golf Courses in the World ‘Liethem’ 😂
It’s Royal Lytham (pronounced Litham)
No wonder it took the Americans so long to find their way to Golf Courses hosting The Open Championship
Forget the golf. Just one of the finest, most decent Australian ambassadors in history. The best, we all wish we, ourselves, could be
He went to the USA before Europe first. Used to room with Sam Snead. But was not impressed with the standard of courses in America and the purses. They used to play a lot of events at poor standard layouts. Augusta wasn't a major back then. The North and South or Western were bigger 'majors'. The Masters were nicknamed, 'Bobby Jones picnic'.
The American game insisted that his success was because he didn’t compete against them…
Eventually, he joined the Seniors tour and destroyed them…
I’m sure the true greats of the game… Palmer, Nicklaus, Trevino respected him immensely…
But, Thompson intentionally ignored the PGA tour, because he didn’t feel tested by the courses…
And the press pack turned on him…