Arnold Palmer is many things to many people ... world famous golf immortal and sportsman, highly-successful business executive, prominent advertising spokesman, skilled aviator, talented golf course designer and consultant, devoted husband, father and grandfather and a man with a down-to-earth common touch that has made him one of the most popular and accessible public figures in history.
His popularity and success have grown with the tremendous golf boom in this latter half of the century to heights few ever anticipated. Certainly each contributed to the other, a fact given recognition when
Arnold Palmer was named "Athlete of the Decade" for the 1960’s in a national Associated Press poll. Before, during and after that great decade,
Arnold Palmer amassed 92 championships in professional competition of national or international stature by the end of 1994. Sixty-one of the victories came on the U.S. PGA Tour, starting with the 1955 Canadian Open.
Arnold Palmer is president and sole owner (since 1971) of Latrobe Country Club and president and principal owner of the Bay Hill Club and Lodge, Orlando, FL, which he and a group of associates acquired in 1970. Bay Hill hosts the annual Bay Hill Invitational, presented by Office Depot, on the PGA Tour.
Arnold Palmer also is tournament professional and member of the board of directors of laurel Valley Golf Club, Ligonier, PA, with which he has been affiliated since its founding in the late 1950’s.
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