Editor’s note: The Chevron Championship, the first major event of the LPGA season, will be played April 18-21 at the Club at Carlton Woods in The Woodlands, Texas. The tournament carried the late entertainer Dinah Shore’s name from its inception in 1972 to 1999 and was played through 2022 at Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage, California.
I am both humbled and excited to share some memories of my warm friendship with a delightful and remarkable lady: Dinah Shore.
I had the rare pleasure of knowing Dinah in two of my varied careers: as commissioner of the LPGA and as chairman and CEO of Taft Broadcasting Company, headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio. But before I get into that, I think it is important, particularly for our younger readers, to understand Dinah was a major star in the entertainment world, particularly in the 1940s, ’50s, ’60s and ’70s. She did hundreds of recordings and had her own highly successful television show, sponsored by Chevrolet.
I first met Dinah when she came to Cincinnati to do a show. Taft Broadcasting had a station in Cincinnati, and I wanted to be sure her visit was pleasant and comfortable.
As a part of her visit, I arranged a golf game at Kings Island’s Jack Nicklaus-designed Grizzly course, which our company owned just north of Cincinnati. My most vivid memory (and typical of Dinah) is that it rained during the night and the course was wet and a little muddy. It would have been easy for her simply to postpone our game, but instead she showed up in long white slacks with bell-bottom cuffs. When I mentioned to her that it might be a little bit muddy, she just rolled up her slacks and we teed off. We had a great round.
When I became commissioner of the LPGA in 1990, our relationship changed and deepened. Her name was on one of the LPGA’s major tournaments, and it became known simply as “The Dinah.” It was played at the great Mission Hills Country Club near Palm Springs. I honestly believe it was the players’ favorite tournament of all the events on the schedule.
Space does not allow me to share my many memories, but several stand out.
First is a fun anecdote featuring Dinah and David Foster, the chairman and CEO of Colgate-Palmolive and one of the most important and pre-eminent boosters of the LPGA in the early days. Dinah always loved to tell the story that, when David approached her about putting her name on the tournament, she assumed it was a tennis tournament because she didn’t even play golf. However, when she learned it was a golf tournament, she went to work becoming a golfer and became a very good one.
The second memory is a very happy one. In acknowledgement of her many contributions to golf, Dinah was elected an honorary member of the LPGA Hall of Fame. I was proud and privileged to present her with this honor at a tournament in 1994. Dinah, who died later that year at age 77, remains the only non-player elected to the LPGA Hall of Fame.
This next memory is certainly not mine alone, but it is shared by millions. When the great golfer Amy Alcott chose to dive into the lake adjacent to the 18th green at Mission Hills after winning in 1988, she invited Dinah to jump in with her. Typical of Dinah, she agreed. What is really fun about the memory is that after jumping into the lake and climbing out, Dinah immediately was given a terry-cloth robe, and her hair was wrapped with a towel. So, she looked every bit the “star” even after jumping into the lake. I thought this was interesting because she was sensitive to always looking elegant, even in a bath robe and with her hair in a towel.
The fourth memory is perhaps my favorite because it says so much about what a delightful person Dinah was. Every year at Christmastime, the LPGA sent gifts to a number of its sponsors and supporters. This obviously included Dinah, and the gift one year was a golf umbrella carrying the LPGA logo. We rarely, if ever, got responses from the recipients, and we didn’t expect to. But the year we sent the umbrellas, I received one thank-you note from – guess who? – Dinah. The note read, “Charlie dear – my golf umbrella is beautiful and ever so timely. It is raining buckets in LA today so you will forgive me for opening my Christmas gift early! Hope you had a Merry, Merry Christmas and that your New Year is filled with joy and love. Thank you. Love, Dinah.”
This, better than any memory I have, shows what an absolutely wonderful and thoughtful lady she was.
So, that’s Dinah as I remember her: fun, thoughtful, very bright, caring, elegant, and unforgettable. I could go on and on, but hopefully these memories will give you some glimpse of this remarkable lady. — Charlie Mechem
Postscript: In a book I wrote entitled Who’s That With Charlie (published in 2013), there is a photograph on Page 101 of my sinking what must have been a long putt. Dinah is shown in the background of the picture cheering, and she later sent me a copy of the photograph inscribed, “For Charlie – My Hero! who obviously saved the hole for us. With Affection Always, Dinah.” I probably didn’t hit another good shot all day, but that was enough.
Charles S. “Charlie” Mechem Jr., the LPGA commissioner in 1990-95, is a former CEO of Taft Broadcasting Company in Cincinnati who served as a personal business adviser to the late Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus, Juli Inkster, Annika Sörenstam and Dottie Pepper. He wrote “Arnie and Jack: Stories of My Long Relationship with Two Men.”