Summer 2009 - Sewickley Academy

“THAT’S JUST SO CAROL” [CONTINUED]
pursue their athletic dreams. Amateur golfers showed character,
something he wanted his children to develop.
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When Semple Thompson graduated from Hollins University with
a degree in economics, she found nothing interested her quite
the way golf did. She suggested to her father that she wanted to
pursue a career in professional golf. Sensing this was a bad idea,
he encouraged her to remain an amateur and said he’d support her
for a year so she could work on her game and focus on competition.
On the course, Semple Thompson found golf to be a fascinating
mental challenge that helped shape her thought processes and
persona. After missing shot after shot, she became angry to the
point of seeing red. Thinking the cliché was only a metaphor, she
was surprised to see the world around her tinged pink. The moment
frightened her and she decided the secret to good golf (and
perhaps a happy life) lay in focusing on the moment and reacting
calmly to whatever may happen.
As she worked the amateur circuit, Semple Thompson practiced
hypnosis and visualization. As she took her stance, she closed her
eyes and saw the ball dropping onto the green, always close to the
hole. “I found that when I relaxed, my body could accomplish what
I visualized,” she says. Never letting nerves interrupt her muscle
flow, she soon found herself in the international spotlight, taking
her first major title in the 1973 U.S. Women’s Amateur Champion-
Carol’s passion for golf was largely inspired by her parents, the late Bud
and Phyllis Semple.
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ship in Pittsburgh. After the 36-hole final match is over, the USGA
president traditionally presents the trophy to the victor. But as the
home-town hero approached the podium, the president stepped
aside so his vice president, Bud Semple, could award the trophy
to his daughter. The moment sealed her decision to remain a
career amateur.
Off the course, Semple Thompson used her economics degree in
investment banking, analyzing municipal credit, and later selling
municipal bonds. Golf practice was squeezed in around long hours
at the bank, and along the way she met and fell in love with Dick
Thompson, a real estate developer and entrepreneur (and golf
lover, of course). They married and Thompson’s successful business,
now focused on self-storage units, enabled his wife to leave
her job, become a full-time homemaker, and pursue her passion
and talent for golf.
Thirty years after capturing her first major title, Semple Thompson
won the one award she will talk about, the one her father would
most approve. She was selected for the 2003 Bob Jones Award,
which recognizes a golfer who embodies the spirit of the game.
“It’s the most flattering award to get,” she says. “It’s given by the
USGA and I was the USGA brat! To be recognized by them and
their highest award, it was just the coolest.”
“I think golf by definition requires good sportsmanship,” Semple
Thompson adds. Where athletes in other sports try to get away
Aside from golf, Carol also enjoyed equestrian in her younger years and
still participates in mock foxhunts in the hills of Sewickley.
with as much as they can, golfers are expected to police themselves.
“Golf asks you to be honorable and if you know you are
doing something wrong, you call a penalty. I think that filters down
to the personalities of golfers. Do the right thing. Just be a good
citizen.”
Semple Thompson continued to be a good citizen throughout
her career. Today, she is the golfer young women look up to, a
household name synonymous with both victory and sportsmanship.
It was no coincidence when the British Golf Museum came
to Semple Thompson in preparing its current exhibit featuring
modern women golfers. Her shorts and a wedge from a previous
Curtis Cup victory hang prominently in the R&A Clubhouse.
Rising stars like Bolger looked up to her as children and now get
to play with her as adults, such is Semple Thompson’s longevity.
Like her heroine, Bolger is one of five golfing children with a very
involved father (he was her caddie at St. Andrews), and another
career amateur, so she felt a special inspiration from Semple
Thompson. When Bolger found herself up against the legend at
the 2006 Mid-Am competition, she had mixed emotions. “That was
the first time I played her head to head,” Bolger says. “Of course
everyone wants to win . . . but to beat Carol is an accomplishment
in itself.” She sighs, still not believing. “I beat her.”
Bolger was equally excited to learn she’d been selected to play
on Semple Thompson’s 2008 Curtis Cup team. “To play under Carol
is the ultimate honor as an amateur golfer.” It was the first Curtis
Cup held at St. Andrews and everyone felt the strain of additional
pressure. The Scottish fans are considered the most knowledgeable
in the world, and the course itself is unbelievably difficult,
with the North Sea winds, pot bunkers, and rough that few
Americans have experienced. But the American squad was able
to remain calm, knowing their captain had golfed there more than
a dozen times for pleasure and in the British Ladies Open.
When the matches were over, with another American victory,
people couldn’t get enough of Semple Thompson. Bolger’s fiancé
even asked his golf hero to pose by the trophy for a photograph
and says his life’s dream is to play a round of golf with her. There
is just something magnetic about a competitor who started winning
before Title IX and continues to beat women a third her age.
The Bolgers were not the only ones who drove to St. Augustine
to celebrate Semple Thompson’s Hall of Fame induction. She has
fostered thousands of such relationships around the world and
everyone was eager to celebrate her success.
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Despite her remarkable resume, Semple Thompson remains
incredulous as to how the World Golf Hall of Fame would come
to select her. “I’ve had a good competitive career and been an
administrator,” she says, “but I haven’t done enough. I guess that
means I have to keep doing stuff!”
So Semple Thompson spends her days organizing charity golf
events, speaking at tournaments, inspiring local Girl Scouts,
competing around the world, and coaching young golfers. She
also serves on the board of directors for the Heinz History Center,
where she helps organize a golf outing every year and raises
funds for the various exhibits, and is a member of the Champions
Committee for the History Center’s Sports Museum.
During her infrequent down time, she prefers to spend her time
with her siblings, stepchildren, and grandchildren. She sometimes
joins relatives and neighbors galloping through the woods of
Sewickley on mock foxhunts, where victory can be as simple as
not falling off the horse.
Semple Thompson insists that the height of her competitive career
is past her, but she still competes, still needing justification for the
two to four hours she spends each day putting and chipping away.
The organizers at the World Golf Hall of Fame would be smart to
leave some white space at the bottom of her plaque.
Carol shares remarks after being inducted into the World Golf Hall of
Fame in St. Augustine, Florida.
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