Offered here is an outstanding 2-9, PW, SW set of 1967 Ping Anser irons.  These irons have hand-forged heads and original Ping Balnamic Tuned shafts with a two-way bend at the base of each grip. This set speaks directly to the genius of Karsten Solheim and the steps he took to introduce perimeter-weighted irons that revolutionized the game.

In 1967 to prep for his first mass-produced irons, the K-1, introduced in 1969, Karsten made 300 sets of cavity back "Ping Anser" irons by hand.  These heads were forged, not cast, and his son Allan milled out the back of each one.  Each head is marked "78" in the back cavity to assist in assembling the clubs to the correct weight. 

The shafts in all the irons, including the wedges, are original Tuned Balnamic black chrome shafts with a two-way bend at the base of each grip. The 2-iron measures 39 3/4 inches.  This is an absolutely amazing feature not always found on Karsten’s forged irons. This was no small bend, as some of the attached images show.

Karsten believed so much in his Balnamic shafts with the two-way bend that he began to use them in the putters he made in 1961 and thereafter. In 1967, however, as Ping was really starting to take off, the USGA ruled his bent shafts were non-conforming. Many golfers including Jack Nicklaus, who had won four professional tournaments using a Ping Cushin putter with the Ballnamic bent shaft, had to leave it behind and find something else.  That decision by the USGA did not set well with Karsten, especially because the USGA allowed Wood Wand putters, made with a separate wood grip attached at an angle to the top of a short wood shaft, to remain conforming because their shafts were not bent... To read more about this head-scratching moment in history, see And The Putter Went Ping, pages 97-104.

The back cavities, still filled with most of their original white paint, are marked "58" except for the PW and SW.  Wedges were not normally stamped with numbers.  These numbers were not production numbers, but rather ID numbers used to match sets together according to weight. This set would be considered to have a medium weight. The original grips have been replaced with Ping Dyla-Grips. 

This is a remarkable set of historic PING forged Anser irons. These early PING forged hand-made irons will ever be revered in the history of the game. They represent ground zero for all the millions of perimeter weighted, cavity back clubs that would follow and will continue to follow their lead.