Jay Hebert

Sport: Golf

Induction Year: 1982

University: UL-Lafayette

Induction Year: 1982

Arnie’s Army was ready to march at Firestone Country Club in Akron, Ohio, in 1960.

Arnold Palmer won the Masters and the U.S. Open in 1960, and was hoping to complete a clean sweep of the major tournaments on the U.S. tour in Akron by winning his first title in the Professional Golf Association championships.

Palmer jumped in front with a 67 opening round, and a crowd of more than 20,000 spectators showed up to support his bid to add the PGA championship to his impressive collection. But former lieutenant in the United States Marines Corps had other plans.

Jay Hebert of Lafayette, La., was developing a bridesmaid reputation on the pro golf tour in 1960. He had been second in four pro tournaments that year, but was still looking for his first victory.

The Firestone course had been remodeled during the winter, and the touring pros quickly found out ehy were in for a tough week. When Jay Hebert and his brother, Lionel, played a practice round with Ben Hogan and Tommy Bolt, Hogan said, “Fellows, this is the toughest course I’ve ever seen.”

The 7,165-yard Firestone layout wasn’t the toughest course Jay Hebert had seen. It was a piece of cake compared to a giant sand trap consisting of eight square miles of volcanic ash: Iwo Jima.

Hebert was 18 years old when he enlisted in the Marines in 1942, and he was a 21 year old lieutenant when he hit the beach at Iwo Jima. Four days later, on Feb. 23, 1945, he saw the flag go up at the top of Mount Suribachi. But the battle wasn’t over. A few days later, Hebert joined a list of 19,000 Marine casualties at Iwo Jima when a Japanese sniper’s bullet struck him in his left thigh. He came out of it with a Purple Heart, but five thousand other Marines were killed on that island.

Trailing Palmer by five strokes after the first round of the 1960 PGA championship, the 37 year old Hebert moved into the lead with a three-under-par 67 in the second round.

“If you got off the fairway, you were in big trouble,” Jay recalled. “Every time you made par, you felt like you had made a birdie.”

Hebert had a double bogey on the tenth hole of the final round, but he bounced back to wrap up the championship with birdies on two of his last four holes.

He picked up $11,000 of the record $63,000 purse in the 1960 PGA championship, boosting his year’s earnings to $33,002. Hebert held off 1947 PGA champion Jime Ferrier by one stroke with a one-over-par 281—a remarkable score on a course that yielded only 13 sub-par rounds in four days.

None of the leaders broke par more than once, and Doug Sanders—who led Hebert and Ferrier by one shot after the third round—was three over par for the final 18 holes.

Palmer equaled Hebert’s even par in the final round, but he had too much ground to make up after 74 and 75 in the previous two rounds. Hogan didn’t make the cut.

Sammy Snead was a stroke ahead of Hebert with two holes to play, but he had bogeys on both of the last two holes and tied Sanders for third place. Only two shots separated the top four.

Since younger brother Lionel Hebert won the same tournament in 1957 (the last time it was decided by match play), the Heberts became the first brother combination to win major championships in the United States since Scottish professionals Willie Smith and Alex Smith both won the U.S. Open—Willie in 1899 and Alex in 1906 (when Willie was second) and 1910.

While the Smiths were great golfers before they came to the United States, the Heberts might not have played the game a all if it hadn’t been for a Lafayette man name Earl Mouton. He introduced Jay to golf on July 4, 193, and Lionel later following his older brother to the golf course.

A 10-year-old batboy for the Lafayette baseball team in the Evangeline League, Jay was walking hom with 60 cents in his pocket—which was quite a bit during the Great Depression. The Heberts lived on Mudd Avenue, where the Lafayette Municipal Golf Course was located, and Mouton spotted the youngster as he walked past the course and asked him if he would like to caddy for him.

When Jay threw the bag over his shoulders and started running, mouton quickly assured him that he didn’t have to run to play this game. After the round of golf, the boy was delighted to received one dollar for his services. Since he couldn’t make that much money doing anything else, Jay decided there must be something special about golf.

After World War II, Hebert enrolled at LSU and helped the Tigers’ golf team win the national championship in 1947 and finished second in 1948—when Hebert and teammate Gardner Dicksinson were selected on the All-American team. The Tigers, coached by T.P. “Red” Heard, won Southeastern Conference titles both years.

Hebert turned pro in 1949 and spent seven years as a club pro, rarely playing on the tour. He became a full-time tournament player in 1956, and was a consistent money winner for the next decade.

In addition to his 1960 PGA title, Jay Hebert won the Bing Crosby National and Texas Open in 1957, Lafayette Open in 1958, Orange County Open in 1959 and the Houston Classic and American Golf Classic in 1961.

Along with his seven tournament victories, Hebert finished second 16 times in his first 10 years on tour. He teamed with his brother Lionel Hebert, to finish second in the 1965 PGA National Four-Ball.

Jay Hebert also played with the Ryder Cup teams in 1959 and 1961, and was Ryder Cup captain in 1971.

In the 1959 Ryder Cup matches at Palm Desert, Calif., Hebert halved a singles match with Peter Alliss, who later became a popular television commentator, as a United States team captained by Snead scored a 7-2 victory over Great Britain and Ireland.

In 1961, the United States won again, scoring a 13-8 victory as Hebert and Art Wall won both of their doubles matches.