Jim Dent, who was one of many few Black golfers on the PGA Tour — in his day or now — and who turned identified for his prodigious drives off the tee, died on Friday at his residence in Augusta, Ga. He was 85.
His grandson Andre Lacey II stated the trigger was issues of a current stroke.
Mr. Dent was a part of a small group of great Black golfers who preceded Tiger Woods (who identifies as partly Black) into skilled golf. Charlie Sifford was the primary to play on what turned often called the PGA Tour after its former guardian, the PGA of America, dropped its “Caucasians solely” coverage in 1961.
In 1964, Pete Brown was the primary Black golfer to win an occasion on the tour. Eleven years later, Lee Elder was the primary to play within the Masters event. And Calvin Peete, one other Black member of the tour, received his first event in 1979 and 11 extra between 1982 and 1986.
Dent collected $564,809 in earnings, however he by no means received a event on the tour, and he didn’t qualify to play within the Masters. His finest end got here in 1972, when he tied for second place, 9 strokes behind Jack Nicklaus, on the Walt Disney World Open Invitational in Florida.
However Dent went on to win a dozen tournaments on the tour’s new senior circuit (now referred to as PGA Tour Champions), which he joined in 1989 at age 50. He received two tournaments in 1989 and 4 extra the following yr. His final victory got here in 1998. In all, he earned greater than $9 million on the Champions tour.
Laury Livsey, the PGA Tour’s historian, stated that Dent didn’t regard himself as a racial pioneer; quite, he credited Sifford, Brown and Elder with that distinction.
“However Dent was a participant, like Sifford, Brown and Elder, who gravitated towards a sport that was not a standard one for Black gamers to pursue,” Livsey wrote in an electronic mail. “He had no benefits rising up and was actually a self-taught participant, one who discovered the sport by observing what he noticed by caddying.”
Golf was a segregated sport when Dent was rising up in Augusta, a metropolis often called the house of the Masters event at Augusta Nationwide Golf Membership. However he was nonetheless fascinated by it. He started enjoying on Augusta programs that have been open to Black golfers, and he caddied on the Augusta Nation Membership and Augusta Municipal Golf Course, referred to as the Patch.
He additionally started caddying on the Masters in 1956 and finally carried the luggage of professionals like Bob Rosburg and Bob Goalby. Augusta Nationwide wouldn’t settle for a Black member till 1990.
Caddying enabled Dent to check the swings of the perfect gamers, together with Ben Hogan, Byron Nelson and Sam Snead.
“My goal was to observe them play,” he instructed the US Golf Affiliation’s web site in 2012, “however I didn’t know what a golf swing was all about.”
He continued to check and enhance his sport, graduating to a tour for Black gamers. After failing in his makes an attempt to qualify for the PGA Tour, he lastly succeeded in 1970, at 31, a complicated age at which to hitch it.
“It was the present!” Dent instructed the usGA. “I discovered if you get on the market with these guys, you bought to provide. You simply don’t wish to be blissful on the market.”
He added, “I received higher every year.”
Dent, who stood 6-foot-3 and weighed about 225 kilos, enhanced his fame for nice size off the tee by successful a driving contest in 1974, sponsored by the PGA Tour and Golf Digest journal, with a blast that went 324 yards and 18 inches.
After that victory, he defined his strategies to The New York Instances in an article beneath the headline “The best way to Drive a Golf Ball Farther: Watch Jim Dent.”
“I don’t hit laborious till I’m coming into the ball,” he stated. “For those who begin too quick, you’re useless. You’ll leap out of your sneakers and don’t have anything to indicate for it. I take the driving force again as gradual because the 9 iron. I simply creep it again.”
The subsequent yr, when the competition expanded and have become often called the Nationwide Lengthy Driving Championships, he completed first, with a drive of simply over 317 yards. The yr after that, he completed fourth, when he drove 292 yards and 5 inches.
Dent capitalized on his long-hitting prowess when he turned one of many first PGA Tour professionals to signal a cope with the Callaway Golf Firm to endorse its Huge Bertha line of oversize drivers. In 1992, a newspaper advert boasted that one Huge Bertha mannequin had elevated his common drive distance to 276.8 yards and one other to 286.4 yards, the longest on the senior tour and greater than that of anybody on the PGA Tour aside from John Daly’s 288.9 yards. Callaway later created the limited-edition Huge Bertha Jim Dent driver.
James Lacey Dent was born on Could 9, 1939, in Augusta to Tom and Carrie Dent. His mom died when Jim was 6. His father, who drove a pulpwood truck and owned farmland, died when Jim was 12. Jim and three of his siblings have been then raised by an aunt, Mary Benton, who labored as a housekeeper.
She was not a fan of his caddying.
“The primary time I caddied, I received a whuppin’,” Dent instructed USA At present in 1990. “She stated if I hung round with caddies, I’d learn to gamble and drink.”
Dent attended Paine School, a traditionally Black faculty in Augusta, the place he performed soccer on a scholarship, however he left after a yr to pursue golf. He earned cash by ready tables at a restaurant close to Atlantic Metropolis, N.J., and performed in tournaments organized by the United Golfers Affiliation, a tour for Black golfers.
Dent left the Champions Tour in 2010, however even in retirement he may nonetheless hit lengthy drives.
“He was nonetheless placing it on the market, 230 to 250 yards, till he had the stroke,” his grandson Andre Lacey stated in an interview.
Dent’s three marriages resulted in divorce. Along with his grandson Andre, the lads’s and girls’s golf coach at Paine School, Dent is survived by a daughter, Charlene Dent Wilkins, from his marriage to Evelyn Inexperienced; a daughter, Radiah Dent, and a son, James, from his marriage to Brenda Dent; a daughter, Victoria Dent, and two sons, Joshua and Joseph, all of whom he adopted throughout his third marriage, to Willye Malvaoux; a sister, Josephine Dent; eight different grandchildren; 10 great-grandchildren; and two great-great-grandchildren.
In 2020, the town of Augusta renamed the street resulting in Augusta Municipal Golf Course Jim Dent Manner.
“He was simply actually grateful,” his grandson stated. “It’s a spot the place he as soon as couldn’t play’’ — Dent caddied on the course effectively earlier than it built-in in 1964 — “so now it’s a spot that bears his identify.”