Lou Graham, the 1975 U.S. Open champion who won five other PGA Tour events, died Monday at age 88, the PGA Tour and USGA said. Friend Joe Taggert, a golf pro at Richland Country Club where Graham was a member, told The Tennessean that Graham had been in hospice care.
Graham captured the U.S. Open by beating John Mahaffey by two strokes at Medinah Country Club in Medinah, Illinois, the report says. That victory remained the centerpiece of a career that included multiple PGA Tour titles.
Other Tour wins listed in the report include the Minnesota Golf Classic in 1967 and the Liggett and Myers Open in 1972. Graham also recorded three victories in 1979 — the Valero Texas Open, the IVB Philadelphia Golf Classic and the CVS Charity Classic — and those successes earned him Golf Digest’s Comeback of the Year award, per the report.
Graham nearly added another major result in 1977, finishing second at the U.S. Open after losing by one stroke to Hubert Green at Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the report says.
On the Senior Tour, later known as the PGA Tour Champions, Graham’s best finish was a tie for third at the AT&T Championship in 1990. He joined the PGA Tour in 1964, the report says, and earned more than $1.4 million over his PGA Tour career and about $600,000 on the Senior Tour after joining it in 1988. He also represented the United States on Ryder Cup teams in 1973, 1975 and 1977, per the report.
Graham was born in Nashville and attended then-Memphis State University before being drafted into the Army, the report says.
