Francis Ouimet Collection

No single person has had a greater impact on the game of golf in America than Francis Ouimet. Though gaining in popularity, golf was still a fringe sport until a 20 year old Francis Ouimet shocked the world by winning the 1913 US Open. It was front page news throughout the country. Ten years after Ouimet’s surprise victory, the number of golfers in the United States had tripled, and hundreds of new courses had been built. 

All it took was a largely unknown caddie from Brookline, Massachusetts defeating the greatest golfers in the world. 

Ouimet’s collection of golf medals, trophies, and memorabilia was acquired by the Francis Ouimet Scholarship Fund after Ouimet’s death in 1967. The collection has remained in the Ouimet Fund’s possession ever since – some relics displayed, but many others simply sitting in storage for decades. Collectors often point to the dearth of quality Ouimet memorabilia in the collecting market. Well, that’s about to change...

Now, approximately 50 years after it first took possession, the Francis Ouimet Scholarship Fund has chosen to auction a few select pieces of memorabilia from its vast collection. Francis Ouimet himself often said “…of all the things I have accomplished, I am proudest of the establishment of the Ouimet Scholarship Fund.” Money raised by this sale will go towards the Francis Ouimet Scholarship Fund’s primary objective - providing scholarships so that deserving young men and women who have worked at golf courses can obtain a college education.

Since the Ouimet Fund is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation, a portion of each winning bid may be eligible for a tax write-off. So bid often and let’s raise money for the largest independent scholarship fund in New England.

Eddie Lowery’s 1936 Francis Ouimet Tournament Gold Medal

One of our favorite golf stories is about Francis Ouimet using a 10 year old caddie named Eddie Lowery in the most important golf tournament in American history. Ouimet’s victory alongside the diminutive Lowery changed the game of golf forever. 

More than just sharing a moment in history, Ouimet and Lowery formed a lifelong friendship. Lowery himself became an accomplished golfer, as well as a multi-millionaire businessman. 

Besides some Eddie Lowery autographs that surface from time to time, the collecting market is completely void of Eddie Lowery golf memorabilia. This fact makes the offered medal even more special, as nothing like it has ever reached the auction block. 

Until we saw this piece, we never could have imagined that a golf medal existed that was engraved with the names of both Francis Ouimet and Eddie Lowery. But here it is, almost certainly one of the only pieces of memorabilia that ties Ouimet and Lowery beyond that one weekend in September 1913. 

This gold medal was awarded to Eddie Lowery as Medalist at the 1936 Francis Ouimet-Jesse Guilford Annual Tournament at Woodland Golf Club near Boston, Massachusetts. Ouimet famously joined Woodland Golf Club as a teenager with $25 borrowed from his mother (unbeknownst to his father) because he needed club affiliation to enter the US Amateur - a tournament he would go on to win twice. Quite amazingly, Ouimet’s friend Jesse Guilford was also a Woodland member who would go on to win the 1921 US Amateur. 

This medal was acquired by the Ouimet Fund from either the Lowery family or Eddie Lowery himself in the 1980s. The entire piece measures 2” x 3/4”, and the engraved medallion portion alone measures 1” x 3/4”.

Letter of Provenance from the Francis Ouimet Scholarship Fund