Harvey learned golf as a caddie. He joined two of his brothers at Austin Country Club in 1912, when he was eight years old, and became a fine player.

 

Harvey served Austin Country Club from 1912 until his death in 1995, first as a caddie, then as shop assistant, and finally as head professional. He retired in 1971, but retained the title “professional emeritus.”

 

Ben Crenshaw (right) and Tom Kite (left) met at Austin Country Club on a monumental Saturday in 1963, when Kite was thirteen years old and Crenshaw was eleven. Both worked with Harvey throughout their careers.

 

Harvey was more than an instructor. He also served as greenskeeper and clubmaker at Austin Country Club.

 

Harvey presents his son, Tinsley, with a trophy after a junior golf tournament at Austin Country Club. In 1971 Tinsley succeeded his father as head professional.

 

Harvey was a public figure in Austin. Texas governor Allan Shivers sits with Harvey at a banquet honoring his thirtieth anniversary at Austin Country Club.

 

Harvey (far right) played an exhibition in late 1950 with (from left) Morris Williams Jr., Alice Bauer, and Betsy Rawls.

 

Harvey helps reigning 1963 Women’s Texas State Amateur Champion Sandra Palmer of Fort Worth with her face angle at Austin Country Club in this photo dated May 2, 1964. Palmer went on to win nineteen tournaments on the LPGA Tour, including two major championships. Harvey gave her the stability she never knew as a child. “It was the greatest thing that ever happened to me,” Palmer said.

 

Harvey left Austin as a young man only to compete and, in his later years, teach. He participated in a PGA seminar in February 1978 in Sacramento, California.

 

Even former U.S. presidents came to see Harvey. Gerald Ford spent a rainy day at Austin Country Club in the mid-1980s.

 

Harvey first placed a golf club in Ben Crenshaw’s hands when Crenshaw was in elementary school. They became lifelong friends and collaborators.

 

A mutual friend introduced Kathy Whitworth to Harvey in 1957, when Whitworth was seventeen. He became her confidant and primary instructor, and a significant reason she won eighty-eight times on the LPGA Tour. “I still marvel at how all this started, how lucky I was,” Whitworth said in 2013.

 

Tom Kite won the 1992 U.S. Open on a blustery Sunday at Pebble Beach. He later credited his early lessons at Austin Country Club, where Harvey would make him practice in the wind.

 

Harvey chose Bud Shrake, an Austin-based journalist, novelist, and screenwriter, to cowrite his Little Red Book. Its rousing success spawned three additional titles, two of them published after Harvey’s death. “The fates had transpired to put me with Harvey,” Shrake said in 2009.

 

Prolific author James Michener, who lived in Austin in his later years, arranged a visit with Harvey to talk about the Little Red Book, published in 1992.

 

Harvey signed his books and wrote notes to readers up until the week of his death. He kept stacks of books in his bedroom, waiting to be autographed, and insisted on hand-lettering each message. “He wanted to finish what he needed done,” said his son, Tinsley.

 

Tom Kite, Harvey, and Ben Crenshaw reflect during a video shoot in 1993 at Austin Country Club.

 

Ben Crenshaw received word of Harvey’s death on Sunday, April 2, 1995, during dinner with his wife, Julie, at Augusta National Golf Club, where Crenshaw was preparing for the Masters. Crenshaw flew back to Austin the following Wednesday to serve as a pallbearer at Harvey’s funeral. “He was a total mess,” friend Chuck Cook said of Crenshaw.

 

Ben Crenshaw (left) and Tom Kite (right) carry Harvey’s casket at Memorial Park Cemetery in Austin on Wednesday, April 5, 1995. After the service, both flew to Augusta to play in the Masters. Crenshaw drove directly to Augusta National and rolled putts in silence on the practice green.

 

Longtime Augusta National caddie Carl Jackson holds Ben Crenshaw on the seventy-second and final hole of the Masters Tournament on April 9, 1995. Crenshaw had just won his second green jacket. “It was like someone put their hand on my shoulder and sort of guided me,” Crenshaw said later.

 

Editorial cartoonist Drew Litton imagined a scene in heaven after Ben Crenshaw won his second Masters Tournament title in 1995.

 

Helen Penick, Harvey’s widow, accepts a bouquet at a press conference announcing an LPGA tournament in her husband’s name in 1998. Their son, Tinsley, looks on. “Harvey would be so pleased about this,” Helen Penick said, “because he always did like the women.”

 

Harvey on May 16, 1994, as he greeted golfers from his golf cart at Austin Country Club.