Ernest Jones (golfer) - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

For other persons named Ernie Jones, see Ernie Jones
Ernie Jones (disambiguation)
Ernie Jones is the name of:*Ernie Jones , Australian cricketer and Australian rules footballer*Ernie Jones , American football player*Ernie Jones , American football player...

Ernest Jones (1887–1965) was an English professional golf

Golf

Golf is a precision club and ball sport, in which competing players use many types of clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a golf course using the fewest number of strokes....

er. He is renowned for his accomplishments in teaching many famous professional golfer

Professional golfer

In golf the distinction between amateurs and professionals is rigorously maintained. An amateur who breaches the rules of amateur status may lose his or her amateur status. A golfer who has lost his or her amateur status may not play in amateur competitions until amateur status has been reinstated;...

s as well as amateurs. He tutored Virginia Van Wie

Virginia Van Wie

Virginia Van Wie was an American amateur golfer, best known for winning three U.S. Women's Amateurs, 1932-34. The Illinois-born golfer was the daughter of wealthy parents, and learned the game at the Beverly Country Club, and during the summers, she would go with her parents to summer homes in...

for many years, including during her stretch of three consecutive U.S. Women's Amateur Championships from 1932–34. He also worked with Glenna Collett Vare, Lawson Little

Lawson Little

William Lawson Little, Jr. was an American professional golfer who also had a distinguished amateur career....

, Betty Hicks, Phil Farley, George Schniter, Horton Smith

Horton Smith

Horton Smith was an American professional golfer, who is best known as the first man to win the Masters Tournament.- Tournament career :...

and other top players of the era.

Early history

Jones was born near Manchester

Manchester

Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. He began playing golf as a young boy and by the age of 18 secured employment at Chislehurst Golf Club as an assistant professional. In 1913 at the age of 25 he was made head professional at that club. As a soldier in the First World War, he was in France. There in March 1915 he was serving in the Sportsman's Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers, near Loos. As the result of an exploding grenade, he suffered the loss of his right leg just below the knee. While a severe injury on its own merit, Jones was afraid it would be a handicap and perhaps be the end to his career as a professional golfer. He was sent back to England where he recuperated for four months. Able to walk using crutches, he proceeded to attempt his first round of golf at Royal Norwich in 1916 where he carded an 83 (38/45) on that first outing. He followed shortly thereafter with a 72 on a long and challenging course. While a relief regarding his prospects for continuing the golf profession, these rounds would prove to bring a surprising and revolutionary change to his concept of golf and its instruction. Later, he was fitted with a prosthetic.

In 1936, at the invitation of Marion Hollins, Jones accepted the position of Head Golf Professional at the Women's National Golf and Tennis Club in Long Island, New York. This was the beginning of a life long career of teaching in the U.S. Subsequent to this position, Jones began teaching in New York city. He had an indoor teaching facility in the Spaulding building at 518 Fifth Avenue.

Instructional development

Jones began to ask himself how it could be that he could yet score so effectively, with such a radical change needing to be made to how his body swung the club having only one leg. Jones himself as well as countless others proved to be able to play well with missing body parts or body parts that were limited in their functioned. Despite the prevalence of golf instruction that described these missing or misfunctioning parts as being essential, Jones and others demonstrated that a golfer's brain would devise compensating strategies to yet produce fine golf shots. This success, in conjunction with his reading of Sir Walter Simpson's book, "The Art of Golf", brought him to the fundamental fact that the key to a successful golf shot was not the correct movement of certain body parts, but the correct movement of the club. Instead of the movement of body parts, the real key was the successful movement of the golf club. Jones had happened upon the then-little-understood fact that the human brain need only experience a persons desire to perform a task. On its own the brain devises a means to create the muscular action to achieve the task. The individual is only aware of "what" they want to do. The brain's action in deciding "how" it will accomplish the task is completely unconscious. This explains how very proficient golfers often report that they have little understanding of "how" they swing and only understand that they can do so when they choose.

Thus it was the case that Jones began his now-famous quest to discover, document, and disseminate a description of "how" the club swung and how to most easily teach the club's movements to others. The result was the writing of many articles on this subject and the publishing of two books. Further, Jones took every opportunity to share his insights with fellow professionals. Jones' simple concept is summarized in the classic "Swing The Clubhead" instruction. Ironically, it is the drastic simplicity of his approach to golf instruction that met with rancor and objection when he was invited by the PGA (Professional Golfers' Association of America

Professional Golfers' Association of America

Founded in 1916, the Professional Golfers' Association of America is headquartered in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, and is made up of more than 28,000 men and women golf professional members...

) to present his work. Horton Smith

Horton Smith

Horton Smith was an American professional golfer, who is best known as the first man to win the Masters Tournament.- Tournament career :...

, then the incoming president of the association, told Jones his system was "too simple. We wouldn't sell enough lessons." Perhaps much to the PGA's chagrin, whereas an average pro would have give about 600 lessons a year, Jones would give 3,000. One of Jones' devotees was Angel de la Torre

Angel de la Torre

Angel de la Torre was a Spanish professional golfer and golf instructor. He was Spain's first golf professional and his five victories in the Spanish Open between 1916 and 1925 still stands as an unequalled record....

who in turn taught this approach to his son Manuel de la Torre

Manuel de la Torre (golfer)

Manuel de la Torre is recognized as being one of golf's top teachers. His career includes playing competitively on tour, head golf professional at Milwaukee Country Club one of America's most esteemed golf clubs, and a career of teaching both tour professional and amateur golfers. Among the tour...

. These two professionals alone would add thousands to the list golfers who benefited from a "club-focused" approach to golf. Jones often said, "The trouble with the teaching of golf, is that one is taught what a swing produces [body movement], instead of how to produce a swing [club movement]." Today, Manuel de la Torre

Manuel de la Torre (golfer)

is the preeminent authority on the Ernest Jones approach and has further developed it in his teaching.

Career overview

His career included playing competitively on the European tour, head golf professional at several of America's most esteemed golf clubs, and a career of teaching both tour professional and amateur golfers. In the years after World War II, he conducted his instruction indoors at the Spaulding Building in New York City. He found that the could achieve better success with his students indoors because they would not be distracted by ball flight and instead focused on performing the swing correctly. Along with Harvey Penick

Harvey Penick

Harvey Morrison Penick was an American golf professional and coach, who coached many Hall of Fame players. Late in life, he became a best-selling writer. He was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2002, seven years after his death.-Golf career:Penick was born in Austin, Texas...

, Tommy Armour

Tommy Armour

Thomas Dickson Armour was a Scottish-American professional golfer. He was nicknamed The Silver Scot.Armour was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, and educated at Fettes College and the University of Edinburgh....

, and Percy Boomer, he was inducted into the World Golf Teachers Hall of Fame in 1977 http://www.golf.com/golf/instruction/article/0,28136,1565308,00.html.

External links

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SPZ4WxaZxI Video Interview Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SPZ4WxaZxI Video Interview Part 2

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