The 1956 PGA Championship was the 38th edition of the professional

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping ...

competition, held at Blue Hill Country Club in Canton, Massachusetts, a suburb southwest of

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

. Jack Burke Jr. won his second major championship of 1956, a 3 & 2 victory over

Ted Kroll Ted J. Kroll (August 4, 1919 – April 23, 2002) was an American professional golfer. Kroll was born in New Hartford, New York. Kroll served in the United States Army during World War II and earned three Purple Hearts after being wounded four ti ...

; Burke had won the Masters in April. It was the penultimate

PGA Championship The PGA Championship (often referred to as the US PGA Championship or USPGA outside the United States) is an annual golf tournament conducted by the Professional Golfers' Association of America. It is one of the four men's major championships ...

as a

match play Match play is a scoring system for golf in which a player, or team, earns a point for each hole in which they have bested their opponents; as opposed to stroke play, in which the total number of strokes is counted over one or more rounds of 18 h ...

competition; stroke play was introduced two years later in

1958 Events January * January 1 – The European Economic Community (EEC) comes into being. * January 3 – The West Indies Federation is formed. * January 4 ** Edmund Hillary's Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition completes the third ...

. This was the tenth and final year the PGA Championship was scheduled for a Tuesday finish. Defending champion

Doug Ford Douglas Robert Ford Jr. (born November 20, 1964) is a Canadian politician and businessman who has served as the 26th and current premier of Ontario since June 2018 and leader of the Progressive Conservative (PC) Party since March 2018. He ...

was stopped in the third round by

1953 Events January * January 6 – The Asian Socialist Conference opens in Rangoon, Burma. * January 12 – Estonian émigrés found a government-in-exile in Oslo. * January 14 ** Marshal Josip Broz Tito is chosen President of Yug ...

champion

Walter Burkemo Walter E. Burkemo (October 9, 1918 – October 8, 1986) was an American professional golfer, best known for winning the PGA Championship in 1953 PGA Championship, 1953. Born in Detroit, Michigan, Burkemo was the youngest of 13 children of N ...

, 5 & 3. Blue Hill was not highly regarded as a championship venue and calls increased for a change in format to stroke play. Also, a five-year membership in the

PGA of America The Professional Golfers' Association of America (PGA of America) is an American organization of golf professionals that was founded in 1916. Consisting of nearly 29,000 men and women members, the PGA of America's undertaking is to establish ...

was necessary to compete in the PGA Championship at the time; this excluded young professionals

Arnold Palmer Arnold Daniel Palmer (September 10, 1929 – September 25, 2016) was an American professional golfer who is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most charismatic players in the sport's history. Dating back to 1955, he won numerous ev ...

Dow Finsterwald Dow Henry Finsterwald, Sr. (September 6, 1929 – November 4, 2022) was an American professional golfer who is best known for winning the 1958 PGA Championship. He won 11 Tour titles between 1955 and 1963, played on four Ryder Cup teams, and serv ...

Gene Littler Gene Alec Littler (July 21, 1930 – February 15, 2019) was an American professional golfer and a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame. Known for a solid temperament and nicknamed "Gene the Machine" for his smooth, rhythmical swing, he once said ...

, and

Mike Souchak Michael Souchak (May 10, 1927 – July 10, 2008) was an American professional golfer who won fifteen events on the PGA Tour in the 1950s and 1960s, and played for the Ryder Cup teams in 1959 and 1961. Early years Born and raised in Berwick, Pe ...

. This remains the only time the PGA Championship has been played in Massachusetts. It was the 8th major championship played in the state and the first in over 30 years, since the 1925 U.S. Open. The next major held in the state would be the 1963 U.S. Open. Burke was the second to win the Masters and PGA Championship in the same calendar year, following

Sam Snead Samuel Jackson Snead (pronounced English_phonology">sni:d.html" ;"title="English_phonology.html" ;"title="nowiki/>English phonology">sni:d">English_phonology.html" ;"title="nowiki/>English phonology">sni:d May 27, 1912 – May 23, 2002) was an ...

in 1949. Through

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, it has only been accomplished four times, with the latter two by Jack Nicklaus in

1963 Events January * January 1 – Bogle–Chandler case: Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation scientist Dr. Gilbert Bogle and Mrs. Margaret Chandler are found dead (presumed poisoned), in bushland near the Lane Co ...

and

1975 It was also declared the ''International Women's Year'' by the United Nations and the European Architectural Heritage Year by the Council of Europe. Events January * January 1 - Watergate scandal (United States): John N. Mitchell, H. R. ...

. The

Open Championship The Open Championship, often referred to as The Open or the British Open, is the oldest golf tournament in the world, and one of the most prestigious. Founded in 1860, it was originally held annually at Prestwick Golf Club in Scotland. Later th ...

was held two weeks earlier in

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Royal Liverpool Golf Club The Royal Liverpool Golf Club is a golf club in Wirral in Merseyside, England. It was founded in 1869 on what was then the racecourse of the Liverpool Hunt Club. It received the "Royal" designation in 1871 due to the patronage of the Duke of ...

; neither Burke nor Kroll played in 1956 (or ever). In the skills competitions held on Thursday, Joe Kraak won the long

driving Driving is the controlled operation and movement of a vehicle, including cars, motorcycles, trucks, buses, and bicycles. Permission to drive on public highways is granted based on a set of conditions being met and drivers are required to f ...

contest at .

Format

The match play format at the PGA Championship was modified in 1956 and called for 9 rounds (162 holes) in five days, Friday through Tuesday. Previously, a two-day stroke play qualifying segment (36 holes) on Wednesday and Thursday preceded the match play competition to narrow the field to 64 competitors. This year, 128 players were entered in the single-elimination bracket. The first five rounds were 18-hole matches contested over the first three days, which reduced the field to four players. The semifinals and finals were 36-hole matches played on the final two days, Monday and Tuesday. * Friday – first round, 18 holes * Saturday – second and third rounds, 18 holes each * Sunday – fourth round and quarterfinals, 18 holes each * Monday – semifinals – 36 holes * Tuesday – final – 36 holes

Past champions in the field

Final results

''Tuesday, July 24, 1956''

Final eight bracket

In the Sunday quarterfinals, Ted Kroll defeated favorite

2 & 1. In the semifinals, Kroll needed only 28 holes to handily defeat

Bill Johnston Bill or Billy Johnston may refer to: * Bill Johnston (cricketer) (1922–2007), Australian cricketer * Bill Johnston (golfer) (1925–2021), American golfer and golf course architect * Bill Johnston (tennis) William Marquitz "Little Bill" John ...

10 & 8, but Burke's match went 37 holes, extended to an extra hole to stop

Ed Furgol Edward Joseph Furgol (March 24, 1917 – March 6, 1997) was an American professional golfer, the winner of the U.S. Open in 1954. At age twelve, Furgol injured his left elbow when he fell off a set of parallel bars at a playground. Despite sever ...

, the 1954 U.S. Open champion. In the final on Tuesday, Burke was three holes down to Kroll after 19 holes, then won five of the next seven holes. The two then halved the next seven holes and Kroll's bogey at the par-3 34th hole ended the match at 3 & 2.

Final match scorecards

''Morning'' ''Afternoon'' Source:

References

External links

PGA Media Guide 2012
– 1956 PGA Championship {{coord, 42.190, -71.137, type:event, display=title PGA Championship Golf in Massachusetts Sports competitions in Massachusetts Canton, Massachusetts Sports in Norfolk County, Massachusetts