Ben Hogan's career did not get off to a fast start. He had to wait seven years for his first win after turning professional in 1931, and he had to wait until after the Second World War to win his first major, the 1946 US PGA Championship. Hogan won the PGA again in 1948, and won his first US Open that summer. Eight months later, he was lucky to be alive. Hogan was fortunate to survive an appalling car crash in February 1949. He might never walk again, said the doctors, much less play golf. They reckoned without their patient's indomitable spirit; the iron strength that in better times branded him as cold and aloof. By January 1950, he was able to take Sam Snead to a playoff in the Los Angeles Open. By that June, sentimentally, improbably, he was US Open champion again. Most remarkable of all was the fact that he was a more dominant figure after the crash than before it. Hogan retained his US Open title in 1951, after winning his first Masters. In 1953, he won five of the six tournaments he entered: the Masters for a second time, the US Open for a record-equalling fourth time, and the Open at Carnoustie in his only bid for golf's oldest title.

While the early 1950s belonged to Hogan, 1953 was effectively his swansong, though he came agonizingly close to more championships, notably the US Open in 1955 when he was only denied a record fifth crown after a playoff with the almost unknown Jack Fleck. Ben Hogan's name, however, will be known for as long as golf is played. Into his 80s, he is still recognized as epitomizing the closest man has got to attaining perfection in golf.

"If I miss one day's practice I know it; if I miss two days the spectators know it and if I miss three days the world knows it." - Ben Hogan

Ben Hogan - The indomitable spirit of the 1950s