8 minute read
Jack & Barbara Nicklaus
Jack Nicklaus
photo by Annie Watt
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Jack & Barbara Nicklaus American Sports Royalty:Excellence, Duty, and Service
By Margaret Bastick Luce & Jadan Horyn
The front door opens and a mocha-colored Labradoodle bounds out to greet us. An elegant woman donning a crisp, light green sweater follows. “Welcome,” she says, hugging my collaborator, Margaret Luce—her vibrant, friendly demeanor instantly putting us all at ease.
Barbara Nicklaus ushers us into a richly decorated, well lived-in home. It is striking because—unlike most Florida manses—this one doesn’t double as museum display space or architectural showcase. It is, rather, an homage to family: to sons and daughters; to grandchildren and great-grandchildren; to the priorities of family life and its myriad attendant memories, dramas and treasures.
As we pass through the living room and head toward the back terrace, Margaret takes note of an array of nutcrackers that line the windowsill. “One for each grandchild,” Barbara says,
keenly aware of everything we take in. “Twenty-two so far.” Outside, as we marvel at two perfectly manicured grass tennis courts and gaze across the gleaming intracoastal waterway, I hear a distinctive voice and spin around. There he is, the Golden Bear himself. The greatest champion to ever grip a golf club shakes my hand firmly, then enfolds Margaret in a gentle hug.
For the next twenty minutes, Jack Nicklaus poses for photos, then makes a beeline for me and stations himself on a sofa arrangement conducive to cozy conversation. “So, we doing the interview here?” he half-asks, half states. I nod nervously. Having yet another golf confab with the sport’s greatest champion suddenly seems journalistically redundant, even wasteful.
Jack looks straight into my eyes, his focus intimidatingly incisive. This man can read any lie, on or off the golf course, with lightning speed, capturing every nuance. It’s a skill which propelled him to a record 18 professional major championship victories. And to design more than 310 elite golf courses across the globe, as he segued seamlessly between two roles: that of athletic genius non-pareil and sports-business maven.
But it’s clear to everyone who knows Jack and Barbara that duty and service to
others have also been paramount lifelong goals. They are dedicated first to each other, then to their kids, grandkids (and even great grandkids now), and, more expansively, to the hundreds of thousands of children they have helped with their philanthropy. “You have clearly striven for that your whole life,” I say. “Where does your charitable impulse come from?”
They glance at one another.
“We didn’t always have the ability to give back,” Barbara replies. “In fact, during the early years of our marriage the concept was quite out of reach.” “My focus was my family and golf—in that order,” Jack adds. “But you have given back quite generously,” I say. “You’ve raised more than $125 million for the Nicklaus Children’s Health Care Foundation.” “Over $150 million,” Barbara corrects, with a proud yet playful smile.
“One day, when our daughter Nan was about 11 months old, she had trouble breathing,” Jack says, by way of explanation. “We took her to the doctors and then to Columbus Children’s Hospital, now Nationwide Children’s. They ran scans and did tests and only through all of that did they find that she had inhaled a blue crayon. They tried to remove it with an adult bronchoscope; the crayon
broke into pieces and entered her lungs; and she got pneumonia. They saved Nan’s life, although she was in intensive care for several days.” He tenderly takes hold of Barbara's hand. “After that we promised each other, if we were ever in the position to help others, we wanted it to be children.”
It’s a story the Golden Bear has recounted many times, and one that his son elaborates on in moving detail in his book, Best Seat in the House, which details 18 golden life lessons Jackie learned from his father. But even now, during yet another recounting of the Nicklaus Children’s Health Care Foundation origination story, the golf legend has become perceptively emotional.
I know the Nicklauses are intensely private but also very devout in their religious beliefs, so I probe further. “Your magnanimity is clearly driven by your values to service and duty. Is it a case of to whom much is given, much is required?” Barbara’s eyes grow large. She exchanges another look with Jack. “Yes, that’s it exactly,” she declares.
“Son, that doesn’t mean I spent my career giving things away,” Jack says, looking at me intently. “I had to focus on my success, my family.” He clearly intends his words to convey wisdom and gravity. “You cannot focus on giving back without
first focusing on yourself. We have been able to do this because of what golf gave me. None of this would have been possible,” he continues—his arms gesturing across the expanse of his beautiful property—“without the understanding of priorities.”
The message is clear. Indefatigable focus on vocational excellence is what opens the gates to impactful service to others. Put more simply, in a crisis in the sky—or anywhere else for that matter—you need to securely affix your own oxygen mask first, before you help the people sitting beside you.
And that is exactly what Jack did. His professional golf career, which began in November 1961, has been nothing short of otherworldly. The Columbus, Ohio native racked up 120 professional victories worldwide, including 73 on the PGA TOUR, over a 25-year span. Only Sam Snead and Tiger Woods have won more PGA TOUR events. But no player in golf history has matched the Golden Bear’s prowess on golf’s four biggest stages: the major championships. He’s won a record 18, including six Masters and four U.S. Open titles. And after graduating from the PGA TOUR to the Champions Tour, more commonly known as the senior tour, he won 10 titles—including a then-record eight senior majors—between 1990 and 1996, while playing a limited schedule.
Nicklaus Family
Nicklaus’s scorecard as a golf course designer is equally remarkable. Since he opened his first design in 1969 at the Harbour Town Golf Links on Hilton Head Island in South Carolina, he has designed more than 310 courses, and his firm, Nicklaus Design, has opened courses in 46 countries and across 41 U.S. states. Nicklaus currently has Signature Golf Course projects in design or development in ten countries, including in neighboring nations Canada and Mexico and farflung lands, like Qatar and Turkmenistan.
But it’s the scale of Barbara and Jack’s philanthropic generosity which speaks volumes about their ever-expanding communal heart. Barbara serves as chair and cofounder (with Jack) of the Nicklaus Children’s Health Care Foundation, which was launched in 2004, in an effort to provide families with better access to world-class pediatric care in the couple’s South Florida backyard and beyond. The foundation supports Nicklaus Children’s Hospital in Miami, funding innovative programs focused on the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of childhood illness. Formerly the Miami Children’s Hospital, the Nicklaus Children’s Hospital— renamed in 2015—has provided care to children in every state in America and nearly 120 countries.
Closer to home the foundation funds the De George Pediatric Unit at Jupiter Medical Center and as many as 20 outpatient and urgent care centers across Florida that comprise the Nicklaus Children’s Health System. For her tireless ambassadorship of children’s causes, Barbara has received the highest honors
bestowed by the PGA of America, USGA and the PGA TOUR, and in November 2021, induction into the Florida Women’s Hall of Fame.
Greatness, of course, cannot possibly be built on a faulty marital foundation. And Jack and Barbara are the very epitome of spousal solidity. They met at seventeen during their first week of college, and have been inseparable ever since. In a day and age when few young folk understand true commitment and selflessness, the Nicklauses have stood side-by-side for upwards of six decades. “Marriage is 90/10% focus. 90% on your spouse and 10% on you.” Jack says matter-of-factly. Barbara looks fondly at her husband, then finishes his thought: “That goes for each. You put the other person first.” Translation: the secret to perseverance in love is selflessness and service to your spouse.
As we drive away, Margaret turns to me. “They’d recoil at the description, but those two are truly American royalty,” she says. She’s right. Jack and Barbara Nicklaus represent something quintessentially precious in American sports history. A couple for whom personal and professional excellence is a driving motto in all arenas. It is how they have approached their marriage, raised their kids, and directed their philanthropy. They are a couple who has embodied duty to one's vocation, one’s family, and one's community. A couple whose lives have exemplified service to something larger than themselves. The Nicklauses have been given much and have done a great deal more than is required.
