Peter Butler

Peter Joseph Butler (25 March 1932 – 11 October 2022) was an English professional golfer. He was one of the leading British golfers of the 1960s and early 1970s. He won a number of important tournaments including the 1963 PGA Close Championship and the 1968 French Open. He played in four Ryder Cup matches between 1965 and 1973 and three times in the World Cup. He played in the Open Championship 23 times, with two top-10 finishes, and seven successive times in the Masters from 1964 to 1970. Golf career Butler turned professional as a teenager in 1947, becoming an assistant to Bill Button at Harborne Golf Club, Birmingham. He played in the 1949 PGA Assistants' Championship, which was restarted that year, but finished a distant 38 strokes behind the winner. He had more success the following year, finishing in 6th place. The leading 16 players qualified for the Gor-Ray match-play tournament which had prize money of £580. Butler lost in the first round. Over the next few years Butler had considerable success at the local level but had limited success at the national level although he was a runner-up in the 1955 Coombe Hill Assistants' Tournament behind Peter Mills. In 1958 Butler became joint professional with Button at Harborne and played more regularly on the British circuit. He had achieved little success when in May 1959 he was the surprise winner of the Swallow-Penfold Tournament. Rounds of 75-72-67-66 gave him a one stroke win ahead of Harry Weetman and the £1,000 first prize. Butler had trailed Weetman by eight strokes after the first two rounds. Butler had his second important success in 1962, winning the Yorkshire Evening News Tournament four ahead of Ken Bousfield and taking another £1,000 prize. Like his 1959 win, this was also something of a surprise since he had achieved relatively little in the interim period. 1963 started with his third £1,000 win, the Schweppes PGA Close Championship where he finished two strokes ahead of Bobby Walker. The event was played at Royal Birkdale in a strong wind with bare greens. His winning score of 306 was the highest for an important tournament in living memory. Butler trailed John Jacobs by 10 shots at the start of the final day but scored 77 and 76 while Jacobs had two rounds of 83 to drop to third place. Butler was runner-up in the Swallow-Penfold Tournament in May and won the 36-hole Bowmaker Tournament in July.