By William Kelly
Jim Fraser, the son of an Aberdeen constable, came to America in 1907 by winning a “Silver Quill” essay contest, joining many other expatriate Scotsmen who found work in America as golf professionals.
Jim Fraser’s first job was at Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx, the first public golf course in the country, which is where he was working when he met Millie Leeb on a train. They got married and when they got to Seaview Country Club, settled into a comfortable house just off the first green of the Bay Course. Those who knew it was there would stop by Fraser’s cellar door for a touch of Scotch whiskey, which he kept in a barrel for thirsty friends.
Millie practiced putting on the first green the morning her son, James “Sonny” Fraser, was born. Sonny grew up to become the epitome of the great amateur golfers of his day. His brother Leo would become an esteemed professional and a protégé of pioneering golf pro Walter Hagen. Together with Seaview owner Clarence Geist, they would alter the nature and style of the game of golf as it is played in America.
Geist didn’t want a great tournament player; he wanted a golf professional who could teach his wife and inspire his daughters to play the game. While former Seaview pro Wilfrid Reid would later become known for his ability to coach champion women golfers, it was left to Jolly Jim Fraser to teach the game to Geist’s family and the new members of the elite, exclusive and renown Seaview Country Club.
As a Scottish professional at one of the newest and most prestigious golf courses in America, Jolly Jim Fraser’s home on the first fairway at Seaview was the destination of many Scottish and British professionals who came to America including fellow Scotsman Tommy Armour, and especially Harry Vardon and Ted Ray.
Vardon and Ray were actually from the British Channel Isle of Jersey, for which the state of New Jersey is named. Besides being well known as the best golfers of their day, they are considered among the best of all time. On their visit to America in 1921, Fraser convinced them to play a promotional tournament at a new course in Pottstown, Pa., which is now Brookside.
Fraser’s good friend and hunting partner, Walter Hagen, played with him, and Fraser’s 10-year-old son, Leo, caddied for his father as Fraser and Hagen defeated Vardon and Ray in one of their only losses in America. They may have had a dozen British and US Open championships between them, but on that occasion, the Americans carried the day.
While Geist detested dogs, Fraser adopted them, especially hunting dogs. Hagen would take the dogs for walks into the pine forest behind the club, sometimes hunting deer and small game.
Hagen was a 20-year-old Buffalo, NY, assistant pro when he witnessed an equally young Johnny McDermott win his second US Open in 1912. The experience changed his life. Hagen was inspired to give up his assistant pro shop job and become one of the first touring golf professionals. When on tour he always stopped by Seaview to visit his good friend Jolly Jim Fraser.
Then tragedy struck. On Feb. 15, 1923, Jolly Jim was killed when his car collided with a trolley. While a series of golf professionals would take his job, the Fraser Clan had lost their father, so Geist stepped up and took them in and provided for their well-being, especially Sonny Fraser, whom Geist treated like a son.
James “Sonny” Fraser was a golf prodigy who as a child in 1922, played a round under 100 with then-President Warren G. Harding, helping Geist win a bet with the president. Harding was elected, if you believe Nelson Johnson’s book, “Boardwalk Empire,” with help from Atlantic City political boss/racketeer Enoch “Nucky” Johnson.
When Nucky Johnson hosted a 1929 conference of organized crime bosses from around the country in Atlantic City, Al Capone disappeared while the crime bosses considered how he should be dealt with for his role in the infamous St. Valentine’s Day Massacre in Chicago, which had put unnecessary pressure on them all. Amid reports that Capone was holed up in the locker room at the Atlantic City Country Club, Geist was afraid of being kidnapped and held for ransom by the gangsters. He was paranoid enough to have his caddy carry a Thompson submachine gun in his golf bag.
After Sonny Fraser graduated from high school, Geist hired him as an executive at one of his companies, requiring Sonny only to play golf with him all day.
Leo Fraser was more rambunctious though, and didn’t want to be coddled by Geist, so he dropped out of school and took a job as an assistant pro in Michigan before taking up Walter Hagen’s offer to go on a cross-country tour, barnstorming golf clubs, selling equipment, putting on shows and playing tournaments like a traveling circus. Hagen would become the first golf millionaire.
He was such a tournament draw that he could make his own terms and wouldn’t play if the golf club owners didn’t allow the professionals in the clubhouse, from which they were previously banned by strict club protocol.
Because golf pros were staff employees, they were on the same social level as the cooks and maids and not considered proper gentlemen, at least as the term gentleman meant in their day. Every golf professional today owes a debt of gratitude to Walter Hagen for opening the clubhouse doors to them. And Leo Fraser, who would become a golf club owner himself, got his primary education riding around the country with Hagen, one of the first great touring pros. Whenever he wanted, Leo returned home to assume the role of golf professional at Seaview, literally his home course.
Then in June 1938, Geist died suddenly, leaving Sonny Fraser out of his will.
Sonny’s new job was secretary to H. “Hap” Farley, the political boss of Atlantic City who took over when Nucky Johnson went to prison. With Nucky’s blessing, Farley took over the political machine in Atlantic City. His right-hand man, Sonny Fraser, was elected to the state Legislature with plans to bring legal gambling to New Jersey in the form of horse racing.
Although there was considerable legal wrangling over Geist’s estate, Seaview continued to function normally because the club had been taken over by Elwood Kirkman, Farley’s Georgetown Law School roommate.
Kirkman also owned Boardwalk National Bank, the Chelsea Title Company, a number of Boardwalk theaters, some motels and the Flanders Hotel in Ocean City, so the Seaview was just one of a dozen operations overseen by Kirkman. It was under Kirkman’s leadership that Seaview hosted a major celebrity tournament in 1940 and the 1942 PGA Championship, won by Sam Snead in one of golf’s most memorable tournaments.
In the early 1940s Leo and Sonny Fraser formed a syndicate that purchased the Atlantic City Country Club from the Boardwalk hotel owners. To back the effort to open the Atlantic City Race Course, Leo recruited a number of friends and celebrities, including Olympic Champion Jack Kelly, Bob Hope and Bing Crosby.
Leo helped get the law passed that brought horse racing to New Jersey and was part of the group that built the Atlantic City Race Course, which also included John B. Kelly. The Philadelphia contractor and Olympic rowing champion was also the father of Grace Kelly, the actress and princess of Monaco who celebrated her 16th birthday with her friends in the Oval Room of the Seaview clubhouse.
The 1940 tournament at Seaview brought together celebrities like Crosby, Hope and topflight golfers including Ben Hogan, Jimmy Demaret and Gene Sarazen. Around the same time, Sonny Fraser persuaded Hope, his good friend and frequent golfing partner, to open the Apex Golf Club in Pleasantville, one of the few golf courses owned by and open to African Americans, who were not welcome at most of the private clubs.
The 1942 PGA Championship at Seaview, won in dramatic style by Sam Snead over Jimmy Turnesa, was conducted in match play, and was Snead’s first major. Turnesa was then stationed at Fort Dix, and shortly thereafter, Snead joined the Navy. Both men served their country during World War II.
While Sonny Fraser was not accepted into the military because of failing health, he became a popular politician and New Jersey state legislator who helped raise money for war bonds and founded the Atlantic City Chapter of the American Cancer Society. In the state Legislature, Sonny Fraser rose to the elite position of Assembly speaker, and got every bill and law passed that he introduced, including the passage of the bill to bring horse racing to New Jersey, paving the way for the Atlantic City Race Course.
Tragedy struck again in 1950 when Sonny Fraser died of Hodgkin’s disease, ending the short but significant career of one of golf’s great amateurs. Before he died however, Sonny held an invitational tournament that attracted the best amateur golfers from around the country. He won the event, which would become an annual affair only rivaled by the Crump Cup at Pine Valley.
While Sonny Fraser was the great amateur golfer, Leo Fraser took over and restored the Atlantic City Country Club, and became a senior executive of the PGA of America, credited with saving the PGA Tour at its most dangerous hour, when the tournament pros were about to break away from the PGA to form their own tour.
Leo Fraser also promoted golf’s international team tournament the Ryder Cup, stimulated the growth of women’s golf by bringing the US Women’s Open to the Atlantic City Country Club in 1948, 1965 and 1975, and helped organize the LPGA, which brought the ShopRite Classic to the Jersey Shore. Leo Fraser was also the host, in 1980, of the first PGA Seniors tournament, now the multi-million-dollar PGA Champions Tour.
The Shoprite Classic, the Jersey Shore’s biggest sporting event, will return to the Seaview the first week of June. Tickets are on sale now.
If you have any questions or comments, please email Billkelly3gmail.com.
