Calvin Peete, a onetime farm laborer who never touched a golf club until he was in his 20s, yet went on to become the most successful African American golfer before Tiger Woods, died April 29 at a hospital in Atlanta. He was 71.
His death was announced by the Professional Golfers’ Association. The cause was not disclosed.
Mr. Peete overcame a late start and other hardships to become one of the leading golfers of the 1980s. His 12 career victories were the most by any black golfer on the PGA Tour until Woods surpassed his record in 1999.
Even without winning one of golf’s four majors tournaments — the Masters, PGA Championship, U.S. Open or British Open — Mr. Peete was recognized as a consistent and formidable player.
He was particularly known for his uncanny skill as a “ball striker,” his ability to hit the ball squarely time after time. From 1981 to 1990, Mr. Peete led the tour in the accuracy of his drives off the tee.
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“You couldn’t point as straight as Calvin could hit the ball,” pro golfer Jeff Sluman told the Florida Times-Union in 2005.
Mr. Peete was the third-leading money winner on the PGA Tour one year and finished fourth twice. In 1984 he won the Vardon Trophy for the lowest scoring average on the tour, at 70.56. Jack Nicklaus finished second.
Few golfers in history had a more difficult path than Mr. Peete. He was one of 19 children, picked beans and corn in the fields of Florida as a child and quit school at 15.
He spent years traveling the migrant circuit, selling clothing and jewelry out of his car to farmworkers from Florida to New York. He was known as the “Diamond Man” for the sparkling studs in his front teeth.
Mr. Peete had fallen out of a tree when he was 12 and was left with a broken elbow that never healed properly. As a result, he could not straighten his left arm.
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Perhaps his greatest obstacle, though, was that he didn’t learn the sport until he was an adult. Mr. Peete played golf for the first time at 23, when friends invited him to join them in Rochester, N.Y.
“Some feeling went through my hands and my body,” he said in a 2012 interview with the Daily Gazette of Sterling, Ill. “I just thought to myself, ‘I think I can learn to play this game.’ ”
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Among the few African American golfers he could look to for inspiration were Charlie Sifford, who died in February, and Lee Elder. Mr. Peete recalled watching Elder play in a televised tournament with Nicklaus.
“I said, ‘There’s a black man playing with the best golfer in the world,’” he told the Washington Times in 2006. “If I practice just a little bit more, I could be doing the same thing.’ ”
Mr. Peete spent hours teaching himself the sport, playing until his hands bled. In 1975, when he was 31, he qualified for the PGA Tour, joining the ranks of the world’s finest golfers. (He had the diamonds removed from his teeth after a few years on the tour.)
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He won his first tournament in 1979, then found himself playing alongside Nicklaus at the 1982 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach, Calif.
“Watching him, I learned all about what you have to do to win a golf tournament,” Mr. Peete told the Los Angeles Times in 1985. “I was a totally different player after that round.”
From 1982 through 1984, Mr. Peete won seven tournaments. He was coming off another victory in Phoenix when he entered the Players Championship in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., in March 1985. It is sometimes called golf’s “fifth major” for its difficulty, the quality of the competition and for its lavish prize money.
Mr. Peete shot 70-69-69 in the first three rounds and was tied for the lead with two other golfers entering the final day. He took command early in the fourth round and sealed his victory on the notorious 17th hole, which includes an “island green” surrounded by water.
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Mr. Peete took aim at the pin with an 8-iron, and his shot landed four feet from the hole. He made the birdie putt, then finished with a 66 to win the tournament by three strokes.
His confident shot on the 17th hole has become one of the most memorable moments in the tournament’s history.
“I noticed that all my competitors looked at me differently and talked to me in an altogether different tone after that,” Mr. Peete told the Arizona Republic last year. “It told them I had arrived, and that I belong in this elite club of golf champions.”
Calvin Peete was born July 18, 1943, in Detroit. His father was an autoworker who moved to Pahokee, Fla., taking his son with him. His father married twice and had 19 children.
Mr. Peete picked so many crops under the Florida sun that he later refused to have a vegetable garden at his house.
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His earnings from golf, including eight years on the senior tour, totaled more than $3 million.
His first marriage, to Christine Sears Peete, ended in divorce. Survivors include his wife of 22 years, Elaine Pepper Peete of Ponte Vedra Beach; five children from his first marriage; and two daughters from his second marriage.
Mr. Peete said he faced little racial animosity during his career, but he was always grateful for the strides made by Sifford, Elder and other black golfers before him.
“I reflect just about every day on how far I’ve come,” he said in 1986. “I really do.”
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