Absence of beloved employees is felt
Augusta National Golf Club lost two of its most famous employees last year.
You won't find their names in the 2007 Masters Tournament media guide, but the contributions that Willie "Pappy" Stokes and Freddie Bennett made to the club and the tournament were enormous.
The charismatic Bennett, who died Dec. 17 at age 76, started as a club caddie and worked as the caddiemaster for more than 40 years before retiring in May 2000. "Everybody in the world knew Freddie Bennett; presidents knew him," said Tommy "Porky" Paquette Sr., who worked under Bennett as the club's assistant caddie paymaster/caddiehouse manager from 1989-97.
Indeed, before he retired, Bennett told The Augusta Chronicle he had met Presidents Eisenhower, Nixon, Ford, Reagan and George H.W. Bush through his job as caddiemaster.
"They'd call Freddie and tell him to get him a good caddie," said the 56-year-old Paquette. "They'd say 'I'm coming in Friday; make sure I've got a good caddie.' Anybody who had ever been to Augusta National or knew anything about Augusta National knew Freddie."
When Bennett retired, Ted Kiegiel, the Augusta National assistant pro at the time, said "this place is full of history and tradition, and he knows all of it."
Stokes died July 9 at age 86. He is considered by many to be the greatest caddie in club history, and not just because he was on the bag for a record-tying five Masters champions.
"Pappy was the very best caddie here," said Carl Jackson, who should know.
The 60-year-old Jackson will be caddying in his record 46th Masters this week, for Ben Crenshaw. Jackson was a regular caddie at Augusta National starting in 1961, when Stokes was in his prime. Jackson was 13 at the time. "You had Matthew Palmer and Ernest Nipper and a lot of other real good caddies, but when you come down to it, Pappy was the best, the very best," Jackson said.
Stokes had winning Masters bags with Henry Picard in 1938, Claude Harmon in 1948, Ben Hogan in 1951 and 1953, and Jack Burke Jr. in 1956.
"He was my mentor," Jackson said of Stokes.
Later, Jackson became Stokes' confidant.
"He knew where the skeletons are in the closet here," Jackson said. "He took it to the grave with him, and I'm going to do the same. He told me some terrible stories. But he realized like any other house, you've got skeletons in the closet. He also realized how many families were being helped by this place being here."
Stokes was born in 1920 on the land that had been Fruitlands Nurseries, which closed by 1918. His family still lived there when the land was bought to become Augusta National Golf Club. In a 1996 interview with The Chronicle, Stokes said he helped clear trees for the routing of Augusta National.
"I was born and raised there," Stokes said in the interview. "It was a farm when I was young. I went out there every morning and I'd plow for cotton and corn. When they started building the course, I remember cutting down trees on No. 10 and No. 11."
Once the course opened in 1932, Stokes stayed on to caddie, which he did for the rest of his life, with the exception of 1943-46, when he served in the military.
"Caddying was the main part of his life," said Stokes' brother, Latimer Stokes. "He could do other jobs, like roofing and siding, but when the golf course would open up in October, that was it; he went back to caddying."
Latimer Stokes said he recalls that his brother was known as "the godfather of the golf course. When the caddiemaster rated the caddies, he was No. 1."
Stokes and Bennett were fellow caddies during the glory years of black caddies at the course, until Bennett became Stokes' boss.
Bennett caddied in 10 Masters, starting in the early 1940s, when he got his first Masters bag as a teenager. He became caddiemaster in 1953.
Paquette, now 56, was 10 when he met Bennett, who was already working at Augusta National. In 1983, Bennett asked Paquette to be one of the first white caddies at the course.
Five years later, he became the paymaster/caddiehouse manager.
"I had an unofficial schooling (from Bennett) in how to deal from the lowest down to the top," Paquette said. "I could talk to Warren Buffett or any of the members and make sure everything was OK and good. Freddie was like their (the club's) ambassador. That's what I picked up from Freddie."
Bennett was much more than just the club's caddiemaster, Paquette said.
"Anytime they had a problem with a black (employee), Freddie handled it," Paquette said. "He was the smoother-over. Freddie would talk to the employee and calm things down. That's just the way Freddie was. Everybody knew him. He once said he doubted anybody in town knew more people than he did."
Edward White, who is in charge of the bag room and cart fleet at Augusta National, said: "Freddie knew every crack and everything about this place."
Paquette said Bennett would help out anyone.
"I don't know if I ever remember hearing him say no," Paquette said. "He'd say, 'Let me check it out or let me look into it.'"
Said Jackson: "As mad as they (caddies) would make him, he was fair to them in the end and got things worked out."
Augusta National members would sometimes ask Bennett which caddies he'd recommend for work at their houses.
"They'd go by Freddie's house," Paquette said of the members. "That's why anytime you rode by Freddie's house, he was sitting out on the front porch. When some member needed something done, like roofing or plumbing or yard work, Freddie would go find the caddie and take them up there."
It was on that front porch at Bennett's home on Monte Sano Avenue that Paquette last saw Bennett, about two weeks before his death.
"We just talked; it was regular stuff," Paquette said. "He said he was feeling a little better, but that he could be better. We pretty much were shooting the bull."
"He'd always smile and say 'I'm doing all right,'" said Augusta National caddie Alex Brinson.
So many people planned to attend Bennett's funeral that it was moved from his church to Paine College.
"There were quite a few (Augusta National) members there," White said. "All the local members were there, and a few out-of-town members, too. It was a big funeral. A lot of people paid their respects to Freddie."
Reach David Westin at (706) 823-3224 or david.westin@augustachronicle.com.
