mytUrN
by JiM DUCiBella
A
guy with the name and
disposition of Howard
“Howdy” Giles has no
business calling Delaware
home. The man is a bonafide
Virginia gentleman.
You’ve never heard of Howdy Giles?
What about Arnold Palmer? That name
ring a bell? Howdy is one of his best
friends, a relationship now going on four
decades. He’s also Palmer’s unofficialofficial photo-biographer, a fact made
abundantly clear in his book, The King and I:
An Unlikely Journey from Fan to Friend.
The fact that Howdy stands at the
front of the line in Arnie’s Army isn’t the
story. How he got there speaks volumes
about him, fate, persistence, the instincts
of Palmer’s late wife, Winnie, and a time
when a fan being friends with his idol
wasn’t an absurd notion.
Howdy, a retired dentist, took the first
of what he loosely estimates of 300,000
photos of Palmer in 1965. Palmer was
sitting on the back of a convertible in
Atlantic City, enjoying duties as Grand
Marshall of the Miss America pageant.
Giles, outside the ropes, yelled to Palmer,
the golfer turned and a 40-year photo
album was opened.
The next part of the story twists more
than a Philly soft pretzel. In 1970, Giles
met the King at the World Putting
Championship, where Giles and his wife,
Carolyn, had a picture taken with him.
A year later at the Masters, Giles
introduced himself to the man whose
house Palmer rents in Augusta. He showed
him the photograph and the man pulled
them over to meet Winnie, who invited
them to walk a few holes with her.
Howdy told Winnie that he and
Carolyn were traveling to Bay Hill after
the championship––on the off chance that
the Palmers were going to be there (they
weren’t). A couple of days later, however,
Winnie phoned the maitre’d at the Florida
40
club and asked him to be sure Dr. and Mrs.
Giles had a good time. Giles left having
spent $250 for a non-resident membership
at Bay Hill, and began entering Palmer’s
annual member-guest event.
It was Winnie who invited the couple
and their friends for cocktails during one
member-guest. That was the night Giles
discovered once and for all, perhaps, where
he stood with his idol. Palmer approached
him and remarked about Howdy and
Carolyn traveling all the way from Delaware
to Florida each year for the member-guest.
“Why don’t you join Latrobe Country
Club?” and play in the member-guest of
the same name on Palmer’s home turf, he
asked. Giles, taken aback, wondered just
how he would be able to gain membership.
“Howdy, you’re a buddy of mine,”
Palmer replied. “You’re in!”
It was Winnie, when she heard that
Howdy and Carolyn were driving from
Wilmington, Del., to Charlotte, N.C.,
in 1975 so that they could purchase an
Arnold Palmer Cadillac (the only kind
he drives), who got them the keys to the
Palmer home at Quail Hollow so they
wouldn’t have to go to a hotel.
“Winnie took Carolyn and I under
her wing and made us part of the family
almost,” Giles recalls. “She knew I didn’t
want anything from Arnie; I just wanted to
be his friend. She always talked about my
enthusiasm. Winnie just really trusted us.”
Ultimately, Giles became Palmer’s
dentist. His first time in the chair was
October 1978. Palmer called, said he
would see him in a week, play Wilmington
Country Club and stay with Howdy and
Carolyn. Giles immediately slapped a fresh
coat of paint on the guest-room walls,
while Carolyn bought new bed linens.
“Hey, the King was coming,” Giles
explains. “To me, this was unbelievable. I’m
just a little fan, and now he’s coming to me.”
Over the years, Palmer has introduced
Giles to some friends, including Bob
Virginia golfer | September/OctOber 2013
Master_VSGA_Sept13_MASTER2.indd 40
Hope, Jack Lemmon, Buffalo Bob Smith
of Howdy Doody fame, B.J. Thomas,
Bryant Gumbel, Kathleen Sullivan, Jack
and Barbara Nicklaus, astronaut Alan
Shepard, Huey Lewis and Jim Nantz,
among others.
Oh yeah, Palmer also facilitated an
introductory meeting with Giles and
President George H.W. Bush.
Giles was in the locker room the day in
1991 when Palmer, age 62, made the cut
at the Bay Hill Invitational. Peter Jacobsen
arranged for a huge cake to be snuck into the
facility then asked for Palmer to come down.
Giles shot the only photos of the surprise.
You’ve seen at least one of Giles’ photos.
His shot of Palmer graces the can of the
Arizona Arnold Palmer half-and-half.
Giles uses the story of Palmer’s visits to
his office as an example of why, even though
he hasn’t won an event since 1988 (in
Richmond, by the way) he remains perhaps
the most beloved man in the game’s history.
“He’d ask me not to have him