FIVE STAR GOLF, WITH THREE SIGNED LETTERS FROM EISENHOWER

(EISENHOWER, Dwight D.) PALMER, Norman. Five Star Golf… With a Foreword by Dwight D. Eisenhower. WITH: Three signed Eisenhower letters relating to publication, and original photograph of Palmer and Eisenhower. New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce, (1964). Five items altogether. Slim octavo, original half green cloth, original dust jacket; three sheets of “DDE” stationery, measuring 7 by 10-1/2 inches; glossy 8 by 10 black-and-white photograph. Housed in a custom clamshell box. $5800.

Original signed correspondence regarding publication of golf pro Norman Palmer’s anecdotes of his rounds with the President. With photograph of Eisenhower and Palmer leaning on their drivers and a fine first edition of Palmer’s book, for which Eisenhower wrote the preface.

Early in Eisenhower’s tenure, he established himself as an avid golfer. One of the newsreels in 1953, for example, features Eisenhower on the fairway, with a voice-over, “The nation’s number-one golfer shows his form on the Colorado links, before ending his vacation in the mountain state.” Eisenhower wrote the Foreword to this engaging account of his rounds on the Newport Country Club’s “windswept testy course, sprinkled generously with 132 sandtraps.” It was published by “my constant companion,” local professional Norman Palmer, who “made up with his superb play for my jabbing and scrambling about the course.” The book is accompanied by the signed typescript of the Foreword itself (which was reproduced photographically in the book), and two other signed letters to Palmer. Also present is the original photograph of Palmer and the President leaning on their drivers, used on page [69].

Fine condition, one letter with light tape residue only.