MARCONI PENNSYLVANIA CLASSIC

September 19, 2001

Arnold Palmer

ARNOLD PALMER: Thank you. What can I say, I just did -- was that the opening I did? It is a tough week. What could you say? We'll survive, as I have just said, and the American people have known disaster and bad things happening off and on through the years, and our history tells you that we will come back. The problem that we have all, are the people that we've lost, and the families of those people, and that's something that we will not ever totally resolve. But we can comfort them and try to make them regain their daily lives, as we all are trying to regain ours. We've known disaster. We've known how to act when we have disaster, and we know how to come back from it, and I hope we will. That's about all I have to say.

ARNOLD PALMER: I was going to a golf course job at Cape Charles, and landed, and actually, at the time I landed was when it was happening and I got in the helicopter and flew to the job and when I landed there, they told me what had happened. Of course, I was -- had to get back home, so I had to drive and left the helicopter where it was, left the airplane where it was, and drove from Norfolk to Latrobe.

ARNOLD PALMER: Well, it's definitely going to affect our lives, not just the PGA TOUR. It's going to affect our every day activities, and I suppose it should. We have -- we've gotten a little laxed in some of our day-to-day activities, and in the security and I'm sorry that it had to be something like this to help beef up security, but it's something that we need to do and something that I've seen enough of it already to understand that the American people are ready to come to the task, and I'm sure that they will. I'm sure that they will understand the inconveniences that happen. We've never been in a war in our lives that we didn't have a lot of inconveniences, and we should be ready to handle those. And PGA TOUR is no different. We are going to do the things that we have to do, and hopefully we'll be able to carry on our daily lives as the President has asked us to do.

ARNOLD PALMER: Well, I suppose I had a thought that maybe in the same resolve as we have been talking about that the Ryder Cup would go on. I certainly understand the players concern and the families concern for going to the Ryder Cup right now, and sympathize with that. And having talked to some of the players and to the commissioner, I think they will resolve it. I think that it's a disaster and a year later and maybe a rescheduling of times will be handled. So I think it will work out very well.

ARNOLD PALMER: Well, you know, that's America and we need to get on with our activities, and golf tournaments, football games, baseball games. The only concern I might have about all of what we are talking about is that we don't forget what has happened. And if we can remember the things that we are saying today and do the things that we know we must do, then I think it's great that we can get back to our activities as normal.

ARNOLD PALMER: You mean my golf?

ARNOLD PALMER: That's a pretty silly question, actually. (Laughter.) I'm kidding, of course. My golf has been very poor. As you know, I've just had another birthday, so I don't feel like that is a problem, but some of my close friends are telling me that maybe I should consider it. But I can still, from time to time, hit the golf ball reasonably well. I suppose my biggest problem is put it together, in 18 holes or for 36 holes or 72 holes. To be able to concentrate that long and to hit all of the shots that I need to hit to play. And, of course watching these young people out here is unbelievable to me, the way they play. And I can go back in history and think about when I was playing with the same objectives they have. I think it's wonderful. I think it's absolutely outstanding the way they play, and what has happened to the Tour. And I just hope that, again, with the tragedies that we have just seen in the last week, that we can get on with it, whether it be golf or baseball or football or whatever it might be. For my act and for my business, it couldn't be better. If I shoot 80, it isn't going to make one damn bit of difference, only to me. And I'm embarrassed sometimes by my scores. But I've had a lot of good scores and I've had a lot of bad. As I said to someone a couple weeks ago, you know, with all of the admiration, there has to be a little humiliation somewhere in the line, too, and I'm ready to accept that.

ARNOLD PALMER: You know, I've thought about stopping playing competitively. But occasionally, I still enjoy it. Occasionally, I have a good nine holes or something. As you know, I'm not playing actively now. My tour business is very scaled down. Maybe this tournament, I wasn't going to play here, for a lot of reasons. One was I didn't want to take a spot for some of those young people I was talking about. So they created a spot for me and I didn't take a spot away, but I really had no intention of playing. And tournaments like -- that I will play, the Hope, that's sort of tradition more than anything else. And the Masters, doesn't affect anyone but me and the people I play with and they seem to want me to play, so I'll play there. And whether I play any other tournaments or not, including Bay Hill, is questionable.

ARNOLD PALMER: Thank you.

ARNOLD PALMER: First of all, let me say that I love Pennsylvania, I love Philadelphia, but if I can get it settled here, I'm going to it do that. That's short of the answer to that question. I'm going to make every effort to do that. But there are a lot of things involved in doing that; and we made a deal with sponsors, we made a deal with the PGA TOUR, and we'll live up to those deals and how that all transpires over the next couple of years, we know that next year its going to Philadelphia; that's per contract. And then there's some contracts that are changing. So there is a possibility that we will get it back here, and hopefully, to stay. But Philadelphia may feel the same way. Of course, as I say, they have a sponsor; we have a sponsor. Those are important things to consider when you wonder where it's going to finally settle. And maybe back and forth is the thing to do. I know the governor kind of likes it, the fact that it moves back and forth between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, basically.

ARNOLD PALMER: Well, first of all, it's very hard and difficult for me to imagine someone wanting to commit the kind of acts that they have committed against the American people. Being a pilot myself and having flown all my life everywhere I go, and reading and hearing the things that happened in those flights and what happens in America, I'm like everyone else; I'm mad. I'm mad, angry, call it what you want, and I want to do something about it. To think that we trained these people, of course you get become to the same thing we have been talking about earlier, security, and when children in a classroom in Birmingham, Alabama saw the news, stood up and cheered, that gets me and I want to do something about it. I want to do something about the mental attitude of these people that would do things like this. And that really bothers me. So, am I involved, my feelings? Certainly. And being a pilot and knowing what these people did with this airplane that crashed right here had a lot of guts involved, and would I have done the same thing. I'm not sure, but I think I would have, and I think that's everybody's thought.

ARNOLD PALMER: I think their thoughts, and this is just my feeling, I think their thoughts are more general to the American people, not particularly to sporting event. I certainly would not put it past them, but I just don't think that that's primary on their list in my thinking. I think that what they did was exactly the way they planned it and the way they had thought that they would get the American people's attention. Why, I'm not sure I understand. And I don't understand the religion that tells you that it's okay to do something like that. That's the thing that puzzles me most. Hell, I know a lot of you in this room pretty well, and I know anything like that is so far from your mind. You might not like somebody, you punch them in the nose, but that's easy and that's not bad. But that's the American way. That's the thing that I do not understand.

ARNOLD PALMER: Well, we had a couple situations. First of all, the club, Laurel Valley. We wanted an event. This club wanted an event. And as most of you know, I'm pretty close to the commissioner and I'm also pretty close to the governor, and through various conversations, we've worked up to where we are today. There's some things that, as you all know, again, that we have to consider and take into great consideration, and that is the time of the year. Everybody says, "Well, September," and all of the things that are happening the Ryder Cup, the sponsors, all of those things had to be considered and those were some things to overcome. We've done it. The players are here and the players love it. I've heard not -- I've been on this business for a long time, and I've never heard -- and I'm happy to say -- more positive comments about a golf course and a venue for a golf tournament. To the guys -- and I've talked to a lot of them -- 's overwhelming, the positive response that we are getting for this week, this golf course, and certainly we didn't realize that there was going to be a disaster such as we had in the last week. And we're trying to overcome that. But the positiveness here is very, very good.

ARNOLD PALMER: Well, I hope I've said that. You know, I know pilots and I know what they stand for and I know how they think. As I say, I've been doing it for 45 years, and they are a great group of people. Just to think that a man is in the cockpit and he's shot or he's taken to the back and has to do what somebody is telling him to do is the most horrible thing that can happen to a pilot, and lose his airplane. Now, we know that there are accidents and things like that, but this is so bizarre a way to do things. It's mind boggling.

ARNOLD PALMER: To land it, you mean.

ARNOLD PALMER: Well, first of all, this is a difficult one because obviously the passengers overtook the hijackers. Apparently that was happening when this airplane was coming right over where we are right now, and it was at a low altitude. I have friends that saw the airplane. Had no idea, except that it was a large airplane and it was very low, which is unusual. And you know that at that altitude, and I'm assuming 2,000, 3,000 feet; that there had to be a struggle going on in the cockpit, and the people that were in the struggle were passengers trying to overcome the aggressors or the terrorists. And I can just imagine a man pushing the yoke forward, and I've got to believe that's what happened. And he pushed it forward -- you know it's just a matter of seconds at 300 miles an hour to go 2,000 or 2,500 feet, and he was probably going fast. He was probably going 300 or faster, and to make the hole and to do what happened, happen.

ARNOLD PALMER: I've discussed that with some pretty knowledgeable people. If you are the pilot and you're playing an airplane and they can't get into the cockpit, no one, unless you unlock it, and that's very possible -- it's almost easy to do, to make that impossible for anyone to get in there. But you're sitting there flying an airplane and you have whatever, 50, 100, 200 people in the back, and one thing you have to have with the back is communication, so they bring a stewardess up to your door and the guy says: "I'm going to shoot her if you don't open this door"; what are you going to do? You're probably going to open the door. Or if you put a marshal on the airplane -- and I'm giving you the negatives -- with a gun, and there are three terrorists and they overtake him; they have got the gun. How are you going to handle that? All of these things need to be thought out before they are put into -- I think we are going to putt people on the airplane, someone to combat this sort of thing. But you've got to think about that and think about how you're going to do it so that I don't really create a problem that you are trying to alleviate. So again, you can say, "Well, the pilot is the guy that has to make the decision." But if he starts shooting people in the back, what are you going to do? Are you going to open the door? You know that you may be causing a worse problem by opening the door than you have in the back, but that's something that you have to think about, and every person in the airplane is going to think about that.

ARNOLD PALMER: Only in very limited conversation has that even been suggested. We want to get this tournament over successfully and we know that next year it's going back to Philadelphia, and we'd like to see that done successfully. Of course, you know the governor was due to be here today and unfortunately, I talked to him last night, and you can understand why he isn't here and I think everyone understands. But tomorrow, he will be here for our Memorial service. And I think he will make some comments and maybe answer some of the questions that I can't answer for you.

ARNOLD PALMER: They have had a couple of incidents that we've had a service at a golf tournament, but not of this magnitude. I can't recall ever stopping an event in the middle. I can recall having a little service prior to the opening of an event or a round, but of this nature, no.

ARNOLD PALMER: I don't know if you were old enough, but way back in my career in the late 60s, I had a back problem, and I think this is probably related to it a little bit. Am I going to play? I have every intention of playing today. And what's my problem? My problem is that if I try to swing the way you've swung for a lot of years, I'll probably end up not finishing the round, but if I can control myself a little, swinging the club and not try to hit it with these kids, I can probably finish the round. And that's just the way it is. My problem is I can't resist the temptation to -- (Laughter.) -- go after it.

ARNOLD PALMER: Thank you.