The Vault: RJ Charles gains biggest golf win of career

The Vault: Bob Charles in 1963. Photo / NZH

This article appeared in the Herald on April 23, 1963.

One of the greatest performances in New Zealand sporting history was achieved on Sunday when RJ Charles, the left-handed professional golfer, won the Houston Classic $50,000 tournament against a representative field of American and other professional golfers.

His score of 268 improved the record for the tournament by five strokes. Among those whom he defeated were Jack Nicklaus, the United States and Masters champion, and Gary Player, the South African holder of the American Professional Golfers' Association title.

Charles' prize of $10,000, the biggest in his career, was attributable, in his own phrase, to great putting.

It was also attributable to the ice-cold temperament which has made this 27-year-old former bank officer the most successful professional in New Zealand golf history.

Earnings

Since he turned professional toward the end of 1960, Charles has earned more than £20,000 from tournaments, exhibitions and sponsorships.

His income from 1962 alone was more than £10,000. About half of this was earned in Britain, where he vied with the Australians PW Thomson and KDG Nagle, and an Irishman, C O'Connor, for the leading place in the tournament-winning list.

In a few weeks in New Zealand in September and October, he earned about £1500, including $3000 for a televised match lasting a day and a half.

Since reaching the United States in January after being married in Johannesburg to a South African girl, Chalres has continued to be successful, winning about $3000 in January alone from professional-amateur tournaments and exhibitions.

Protected

He is now so highly regarded that he is a member of the "stable" of the greatest golfers in the world - Nicklaus, Player, Arnold Palmer and Doug Sanders - which has been formed by an American lawyer, Mark McCormack, to protect their earnings from taxation.