Roland Hancock

   Another name for Roland was Rollie.

  General Notes:

The 1930 Federal Census for Lynchburg City, Campbell Co., Va., ED# 1, page 120B records Roland Hancock (23 - Golf Professional born in New York, father in England, mother in NY) living in the home of his parents Thomas (45 - Golf Professional born in Surry, England) and Minnie (47 - New York/NY/NY) Hancock living on Rivermont Avenue near Link Road next to Oakwood Country Club. Thomas and Minnie have been married for 16 years ... although it appears that it should be 26 years since Roland is 23 years of age.

The SSDI records:
Roland Hancock
SSN: 031-16-4392
Last Residence: 32127 Daytona Beach, Volusia, Florida
Born: 23 Feb 1907
Died: 26 Feb 1997
State (Year) SSN issued: Massachusetts (Before 1951)


My Dad Almost Won the Open
Roland Hancock's son on what the near-miss meant to his father
By JOSHA HILL
Associate Editor, GOLF MAGAZINE
Roland Hancock was a little known 21-year-old golf pro when he teed it up at the 1928 U.S. Open at Olympia Fields, just outside of Chicago. He led with two holes to play in the final round, then had a meltdown, playing the last two holes in 3 over par and missing out on a playoff by a single shot. Hancock then vanished from the world of competitive golf.
Hancock's son, Tom, 71, remembers what the Open near miss meant to his father, who passed away in 1997 at age 90, and to the Hancock family.
"My father didn't bring up the subject of the 1928 U.S. Open, but he didn't shy away from it either. If you asked, he would tell, and growing up, I asked about it a lot.

"Back in those days, they didn't have spectator ropes; people pretty much walked around as they pleased, and that could occasionally lead to some chaos. When Dad finished the 16th hole, he was the only player left on the course with any chance of winning. [Bobby Jones and Johnny Farrell were already tied in the clubhouse.] That's when the crowd began to swell, and play eventually had to be stopped to clear the fairway. So Dad sat on that tee for about 20 minutes with one thing on his mind: I'm about to be U.S. Open champion. He never made any excuses, but he often told me that without that wait on the 17th tee, if he'd been able to keep his momentum...
"Was he angry about losing? Maybe a little. I know I am sometimes. Our life might have been different with the title 'U.S. Open Champ' behind his name. It opens doors. Johnny Farrell [who went on to beat Bobby Jones in the playoff] spent his career as Baltusrol's head pro. Dad spent his at Mt. Hood Country Club in Melrose, Massachusetts. But the most important thing to Dad was playing the ball as it lies. And that's exactly what he did after 1928. He gave us a good life, and I miss him."



Searching for Roland Hancock
Recovering a long-lost piece of Olympia Open history Thursday June 12, 2003
By SAL JOHNSON
Contributing Editor, GOLFONLINE
OLYMPIA FIELDS, Ill. -- In the 108 years of the U.S. Open, the greatest golfers in the world have won, as well as surprise winners such as Sam Parks, Tony Manero and Orville Moody. They could be considered golf's Cinderellas, who won their Opens, then, like the fairy-tale princess, disappeared before the spell was broken.
Then there are those who almost won, but whose spell broke too soon. One of those was a young professional from Wilmington, North Carolina named Roland Hancock. He came breathtakingly close to clinching the 1928 U.S. Open at Olympia Fields, before finishing third to Bobby Jones and champion Johnny Farrell.
His loss intrigued me, for as much as I love the Tigers and Nicklauses of the world, I also love the long shots, those up against all odds. In a way, Roland Hancock could be described as the U.S. Open's version of Jean Van De Velde, the only difference being that Hancock never cashed in on his misfortune the way Van De Velde did; in fact, just after the Open, Hancock fell off the face of the earth.
At the time of the Open, Hancock was the 19-year-old son of a Wilmington, North Carolina golf professional. When he arrived at Olympia Fields, Hancock was basically an unknown pro, overshadowed by the greatest players in the world at the time, Bobby Jones, Walter Hagen, Tommy Armour and Johnny Farrell.
Hancock shot 74-77 to sit way back in the pack, seven back of second-round leader Bobby Jones. In those days, the U.S. Open was completed in three days with a 36-hole final, so anything could happen. Hancock shot 72 in the third round to pick up a stroke on Jones, but when Hancock teed off in the final round, nobody thought he had much of a chance.
Back then, the pairings weren't grouped by score, so Hancock was in one of the final groups, paired with former British Amateur champion Willie Hunter. Heavy showers soaked the course overnight and although skies had cleared for the morning round, clouds thickened over the day to produce an electrical storm in the afternoon. Even as lightning flashed everywhere, play continued. While the leaders were fighting it out for the championship, Hancock and Hunter quietly went about their business, not bothered by the crowds that were starting to gather.
Jones shot a 40 on the front nine of his final 18, while Hancock made it in 33. Before Hancock knew it, he was leading the championship, and word quickly spread through the 15,000 gathered to watch the finale. As Hancock and Hunter finished their round, the gallery swelled from a dozen spectators to several hundred. By the time Hancock rolled his 40-footer in for birdie on No. 13, the crowd of hundreds turned into thousands. By the time Jones, Hagen and Farrell finished, Hancock and Hunters were followed by 10,000 spectators.
Despite the blockbuster crowd observing him on that stormy afternoon, Hancock retained his composure to par the 14th, 15th and 16th holes. By the time he reached the 17th tee, it became clear to everyone in attendance that Hancock had the championship under his thumb -- all he needed to do to beat the 294 score posted by Jones and Farrell was finish the last two holes in one over par. These last two holes were comparatively simple, a short par four (presently the 8th hole for this year's championship) and a short par five (presently the 9th hole, playing as a par four this year).
However, for Hancock the simple task became a logistical nightmare, as 15,000 people streamed across the 17th hole, refusing to heed the calls of marshals to clear the fairway for Hancock and Hunter. This created a chaotic situation for the competitors. It's important to remember that back in 1928, there were no gallery ropes to funnel the spectators; fans were allowed to walk alongside the players in the fairway.
After a five minute delay, the 17th fairway was finally cleared and Hancock hit what he thought was a perfect drive. But the galleries made the hole look differently, so instead of placing the drive in the fairway it landed in rough directly behind a tree. The afternoon's rain also meant the ball was now resting in mud. Again the gallery became a problem for Hancock who, due to the masses swarmed around him, had difficulty judging the distance to the green. After marshalls cleared a path, Hancock half-topped a niblick. and the ball remained in rough. Again the marshals had to clear a path so that Hancock had room to swing his club. Hancock pitched over the green and then chipped back, taking two putts for a double-bogey six.
However, all was not lost, as a par on the last hole would place him in a playoff against Bobby Jones and Johnny Farrell. Although par was an easy score on the par-five hole, Hancock remembered that he had bogeyed the hole that morning. In growing darkness, amid the noise and congestion from the gallery, Hancock rushed his drive and pulled it left. He was left with a poor lie, forcing him to chip back out onto the fairway.
Hancock still had a chance of getting home in three and a possible birdie putt. Then, more delay. After Hunter hit his second shot, it struck the head of a spectator who walked out in front of Hunter. People rushed over to aid the injured man and for nearly 15 minutes, Hancock was forced to wait as the unconscious man was carried off the fairway. Hancock ended up lunging at his shot, coming up short of the green. He then pitched up, but from 20 feet missed his par putt and lost a chance at winning the U.S. Open.
The final-round collapse appeared to deeply affect Hancock. He played in several tournaments following his loss, but couldn't find the magic he had made for 70 holes at Olympia Fields. If you look at his Open record, he played six times between 1926 and 1934, but only made the cut once, in 1928. As the Great Depression hit, Hancock seemed to have disappeared from the golf scene.
So on a snowy day earlier this year, as I read about Hancock, I began to wonder what happened to him. I then realized that he would now be around 90 years old -- if he was still alive. I reasoned that he probably had some relatives or offspring who could tell me what happened to him, so I decided to look him up.
I visited the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., and poured over the pages of the old American Golfer magazine to see if there was any record of any other tournaments he had played in the years following the U.S. Open. However, other than the 1928 U.S. Open, Hancock's name was never mentioned. I then went online and searched for anything with the term Hancock and discovered that shortly after his U.S. Open loss, Hancock became a professional at the Linville Golf Club in North Carolina. So I called up Linville, thinking that they could update me on Hancock's whereabouts. However, the current pro didn't even know that Hancock had worked at Linville.
He directed me to a Mr. Pottle, who had served as the club historian for the last 50 years and now resided in Pinehurst. However, Mr Pottle's son, Peter, informed me that his father was in the hospital, seriously ill. Peter did manage to speak to his father recently about Hancock and found out that Hancock had moved to Titusville, Florida, where he had been a starter/marshall at a local club during the 1980s. I called all of the clubs within a 100 mile radius, but not one person had heard of Hancock.
When I arrived at Olympia Fields earlier this week, I tried again to search for some possible answers to the mystery of what happened to Hancock, but again came up empty-handed. What's really disappointing is that during my three-month search for Hancock, not a single soul, with the exception of Pottle, had ever heard of him.
Hancock may have been a small blip in the world of golf, a man who became famous for one hour back in 1928 before disappearing into oblivion for the next 75 years. Yet it's only fitting that we remember what Hancock did on that stormy day in 1928, a piece of golf history at Olympia Fields that has for too long been forgotten.

  Noted events in his life were:

• Occupation: Golf Professional.

Roland married Eleanor Frances Adkins, daughter of John Peter Adkins and Mabel Clare Morrison, on 8 Aug 1931. (Eleanor Frances Adkins was born on 6 Aug 1911 in Campbell Co., VA. and died in Jul 1986 in Port Orange, Volusia, Florida.)