Bad Bruce Stays and Still Plays Good Golf : Senior tour: Crampton is an Australian who found success in the United States and has never looked back.

Australian Bruce Crampton came to the United States in 1957 to play a little golf. He never really left.

Considering his experiences as a 21-year-old on his first trip away from home, it’s a wonder he stayed around. That’s when he began building his reputation as Bad Bruce Crampton.

He is an intense competitor who rarely smiles while playing. Otherwise, he is friendly, talkative and funny. He can look back and laugh at his early tribulations.

His play on the PGA Tour, on which he earned more than $1 million and won 15 events; and the senior tour, with 18 victories and more than $2 million in winnings, make it easier.

Crampton, who won the Australian Open in 1956, at 20, had been invited to play in the Masters. He thought he would get accustomed to the United States by playing in a few tournaments, beginning at Houston.

“We didn’t have television in Australia, so the only thing I knew about Texas was from cowboy movies,” Crampton recalled. “It took two nights to fly from Sydney to San Francisco and on to Houston. There were no jets and I was worn out.

“It was about 11:30 at night on the Saturday before the tournament when I arrived in Houston. The last leg took some eight or nine hours in a DC-6. I had a reservation at the Rice Hotel in Houston. I took the limousine in from the airport.

“As we drove into the city, I saw all these people in cowboy clothes. I also saw covered wagons, horseback riders and there were people shooting pistols. I really didn’t think it was anything unusual. I thought it was really the Wild West. I didn’t think anything of it, I just went up to my room and went to sleep.

“The next morning I went to the cafeteria in the basement and asked for what I wanted. The girl kept saying, ‘I guess we don’t have that.’ I finally got something to eat. The cowboys were still around and even some Indians, and there was shooting and yelling.

“I went up to my room and started thinking about it. I remembered in those movies I had watched that when strangers showed up in a town they were usually bad guys. Nine out of 10 of them were hanged. I was one scared kid. For the next three days I didn’t open my mouth. I pointed at everything I wanted.”

A couple of days before the tournament, Crampton met professional golfers Milon Marusic, Bob Gadja and Jack Fleck.

“I was particularly impressed with Fleck,” Crampton said. “He drove a yellow Cadillac given to him by people in Des Moines after he won the U.S. Open (in 1955).

“They straightened me out. It seems I had arrived during the Fat Stock Show celebration. There was no reason for me to be scared. They even took me to a rodeo and I saw Roy Rogers and Trigger. I had a great time.”

Crampton shot par and finished 13th in the Houston Open.

“When I won the Australian Open, I won the equivalent of $500 U.S.,” he said. “When I left Australia, they made a special dispensation and allowed me to bring $2,500. I earned either $672 or $772 with my 13th place.

“I decided right away this was where I should play golf.”

Crampton has returned to Australia only for visits. He became a Texas resident in 1961. Crampton and his wife, Joan, also have a place near Palm Springs.

That’s where he prepared for the first tournament this season, the Infiniti Tournament of Champions at La Costa, which he won by four shots. His next appearance in the area will be at Ojai March 1-3 in the GTE West Classic.

Crampton always felt he was unfairly tagged with the nickname Bad Bruce.

The problem began in Scotland not too long after he played in the Masters, when he was still a naive 21-year-old.

“The Sydney Telegraph signed me to make reports on my trip, to preview tournaments and give my impression of golf where I played,” Crampton said. “In this country, I called a fellow in New York and the article was ghosted.

“You know how well we are treated at the Masters. It wasn’t anything like that in Scotland.

“I arrived too late to qualify for the British Open, but I was going to play the next week in Glasgow, Scotland. Gary Player asked me to drive a friend’s Morris Minor to Glasgow.

“I arrived on Saturday and a porter met me as I drove up to the club.

“Get out,” he said. “Pros aren’t allowed here on Saturday.”

“I asked him if I could just leave my clubs until Monday.”

“No,” he answered. “Get out of here.”

When Crampton went to the club to practice on Monday, he had to park on the street. Only members could park at the club. They gave him a lunch ticket, a drink ticket and a tea ticket, but he wasn’t permitted to eat in the clubhouse.

“Where I could eat in the employees’ cafeteria, they seemed to resent pro golfers,” Crampton said. “They just threw the food on the plate. The woman serving the fruit salad mixed it with her hands, then scooped up some and tossed it on the plate. I lost my appetite.

“My father was a detective captain in Sydney, and he always told me to tell the truth. By telling the truth, I could avoid a lot of trouble, he said.

“I called my ghost writer . . . and told him the truth--about the difference in the treatment in Glasgow and at the Masters.”

British correspondents in Sydney had informed their papers about Crampton’s comments, creating quite a stir. For a few days, Crampton shared headlines with Princess Margaret.

Commander Roe, in charge of the British PGA, tried to get the Australian PGA to expel Crampton. The Bad Bruce reputation was established.

“There were other instances of a credibility gap along the way,” Crampton said. “And I don’t suppose I’ll ever live it down.

“But some people don’t think I’m really Bad Bruce Crampton.”

Although he is 55, an age at which most seniors start to tail off, Crampton, a physical fitness advocate, shows little sign of age.

“I’ve been told I have the body of a young man,” he said, “and that’s what I go by. I don’t feel old.”

Lee Trevino told Golf Digest that Crampton has the best swing among the 50 and older set.

“I’m glad to see him more relaxed,” Trevino said. “He seems to have mellowed. He always was a terrific competitor.”

Crampton agreed that he probably had mellowed. “They used to say I wouldn’t talk,” he said. “Now, once you get me started talking, you can’t stop me.”