Lee Trevino

From taking on hustlers to making Open history, Lee Trevino’s double triumph is a tale from a bygone era.

The man they called ‘Merry Mex’ is as gallantly good-humoured as they come, an acknowledgement that his life on the pro circuit was a far cry from an upbringing on the cotton fields of east Dallas.

He may not have been dealt the best hand, ascending from a three-room shack with no plumbing, but one which was crucially only 100 yards off the seventh fairway of the Glen Lakes Country Club.

He began caddying at the age of eight and when he was old enough to compete in head-to-head matches, he would often wager more than he could afford to lose.

For as strong as his love of golf was, Trevino was little more than an idiosyncratic amateur until another Champion Golfer inadvertently set him on the path to stardom. While playing at Shady Oaks in Fort Worth, Trevino saw 1953 Open winner Ben Hogan on the practice range.

From that day on, the six-time major winner honed a fade that would make him one of the most accurate players the game has ever seen.