Overview
- As the PGA Championship plays at Aronimink, coverage is retracing the Wanamaker Trophy’s backstory from Rodman Wanamaker’s 1916 donation to its place as golf’s largest major trophy.
- The original stands about 28 inches tall, weighs roughly 27 pounds, and is sterling silver with gold gilding, now displayed at the PGA of America museum in Frisco, Texas.
- After Walter Hagen lost the original following his 1925 win, the PGA commissioned a duplicate in 1926, and reports say the original resurfaced around 1930–1931 near a Detroit factory.
- Today’s champion gets the full-size trophy for one year and also receives a roughly 90% replica to keep permanently, with the winner’s name engraved on the original each year.
- Jack Nicklaus says he still carries the money clip he won for the 1963 PGA driving-distance contest, a side event revived for charity in 2014 that has not run regularly in recent years.