THE BOSTWICK BROTHERS are the most versatile great athletic siblings in United States history. There have been greater athletes, perhaps—Jim Thorpe won gold medals in the Olympics and played pro baseball and football, and Deion Sanders appeared in both the Super Bowl and the World Series. There are siblings like the Manning brothers and the Williams sisters, but none more successful than the Bostwicks.

Pete and Jimmy Bostwick exemplify the amateur ideal. Both played in the U.S. Open in golf, and Jimmy won the French

Amateur Championship. Pete played tennis in the U.S. Nationals at Forest Hills—one of three men to have played for national titles in both golf and tennis. Both brothers played ice hockey, and Pete tried out for the Olympics in 1960. Both were world champions in court tennis, and Pete won the U.S. Open in racquets and the U.S. 40s in squash.

The Bostwicks have, for generations, been Long Island royalty. Their great-grandfather, Jabez Bostwick, was founder and treasurer of Standard Oil and partner of J.D. Rockefeller.

The Brothers Bostwick:

THE GREATEST EVERB Y J A M E S Z U G

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This page: “Before the Match” by Lisa Bostwick depicts the artist’s grandfather,

Pete Bostwick, Sr., with Tommy Hitchcock. Opposite page: Pete Bostwick, Jr.,

was an accomplished golfer; three sets of victorious brothers, the Van Alens,

the Knoxes, and Pete and Jimmy Bostwick (inset).

They grew up with their sister, Laura, in Old Westbury and in Aiken, South Carolina. Their great-aunts, Margaret Curtis and Harriet Curtis, won a total of four national golf championships collectively and founded the Curtis Cup, the bi-annual women’s amateur golf match between the U.S. and the U.K. Their father, Pete, Sr., was a noted jockey in both flat and steeplechase—a famed trainer of winners and one of the great polo players of all time, winning six U.S. Opens and reaching an eight-goal rating. When he suffered a heart attack riding out for the last chukker in a match, he pitched forward but never fell off his horse.

Pete, Jr., and Jimmy attended Aiken Preperatory School before Pete went on to St. Paul’s and Middlebury and Jimmy on to the Dublin School. Pete worked as a stock broker at H.N. Whitney; Jimmy worked as a salesman for an aviation company. Both Pete, 78, and Jimmy, 75, have been married for more than 50 years.

GOLFPete won the 1958 New England intercollegiate title as a senior at Middlebury College, as well as the 1966 Long Island Amateur and the 1968 Northeast Amateur. In 1959, he qualified for the U.S. Open at Winged Foot, where he shot a 153 and missed the cut by three strokes. Just six amateurs made the cut.

In 1964, Jimmy won the French Amateur Championship in the 36-hole final. He reached the fifth round of the British Amateur, qualified for the 1964 U.S. Amateur, and won the Piping Rock Club Championship in six different decades. He played in the 1968 U.S. Open, missing the cut by 15 strokes.

The most notable time that the brothers played against each other was in the second round of the 1960 Walter Travis, when Jimmy beat Pete. Together, in 1970 and 1974, they won the Anderson Memorial four-ball tournament at Winged Foot.

Pete Bostwick, Jr.: I was very fortunate to play about eight rounds with Ben Hogan. I used to go to Florida to Hope Sound with my late mother and stepfather for two weeks for spring vacation. I had a guest card at Seminole. In 1961, I hadn’t played in five or six months, hadn’t hit a ball. I went over there. I was invited to play with Ben. He couldn’t have been nicer. He actually played with my father in a pro-am in Aiken, around 1946 or 1948, when Jimmy and I were at Aiken Prep School. We were allowed to go and watch them play. Anyhow, Ben shot a 66 from the gold tees there that day.

Ben used to go to Seminole and practice for a month to get ready for the Masters. He’d usually practice from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. He’d hit balls for two hours. He was so precise that he took a very little divot, like a thin slice of cheese. He’d practice for two hours and there’d be a little patch, a foot by a foot, where he had practiced. Then he’d go up and have lunch and hit a few putts.

He was still, you know, in his late forties, early fifties. I had never played with anybody who was such a precise ball-striker as that. I played with Sam Snead in a pro-am at Upper Montclair in 1966, and he was a beautiful player and had a great swing. I played with a lot of other good players. I played four or five rounds with Jack Nicklaus in the ’60s and of course Jack was one of the great players. But as far as precise

striking of the golf ball, no one was near to Ben Hogan. And Hogan, when he was a little older, he started to have a little trouble with the putting. He froze a little bit. He had trouble bringing the putter back. Actually, one day on the 13th hole at Seminole—a par-three—he had a three- or four-foot putt for par. He knocked it in but had hit it twice. He didn’t do that often. He called it on himself.

Jimmy Bostwick: At the French Amateur, I had quite an argument with this guy from England in the semis. He was really quite a good guy, Drew Montague. The argument started during a practice round. There was a dogleg left and I was pretty strong in the rough back then, and I’d get a wedge

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or a nine-iron to the green if I landed in the rough. He said, “Jimmy, that is not the way to play it. You play it with a five-wood or a three-wood out to the right and then a seven-iron to the green.” I said, “Drew, you do whatever you want.”

I ended up playing him in the semis. Every time he had a little putt, I didn’t know whether to give it to him. I knew that he didn’t like to putt short putts. But I don’t like to putt short putts, either. So, the first time, he looked at me and I said nothing. The second time he muttered something. The third time, he said some more. He said, “Jimmy, if you care so much about this goddamn tournament, why don’t we walk in right now?”

I said, “That’s perfect, that’s perfect. I’m staying right here.” We finished the round—I beat him one-up—and we were friends and shook hands.

COURT TENNISPete and Jimmy were two of the greatest amateurs in the 1,000-year-old history of the game of court tennis. They often played on the weekends at the Greentree estate in Manhasset, but most of their play was at the Racquet and Tennis Club.

Pete was world champion between 1969 and 1972. He won the U.S. Open singles three times and doubles three times with brother Jimmy, as well as the U.S. Amateur singles six times and doubles three times.

Jimmy was world champion from 1972 to 1975. In addition to the three U.S. Open doubles he won with Pete, he won the U.S Open singles seven times, the U.S. Amateur singles four times, and the U.S. Amateur doubles three times. In 1959, Jimmy astonished everyone when, as a 22-year-old, he beat world champion Norty Knox in the finals of the U.S. Amateur.

In 1964, they faced each other for the first time in a major tournament. The brothers twice faced each other for the World Championship—in 1970, Pete retained his title by beating Jimmy 7 to 1 in the best of a 13-set match; in 1972, Jimmy took the title by winning 7 to 2.

Jimmy: When I was 19, I was down in Aiken. Pierre Etchebaster said to me, “You’ve got a car, right?” “Yeah, I sure do.” I drove Pierre and his wife from Aiken, South Carolina, to Riverside Drive in Manhattan. We ran into a snowstorm starting in Virginia. I had had quite a big night the night before we left and wasn’t feeling so well. Finally, we get to a bridge over the Hudson, we get halfway across and there is a hill of snow and everyone is stuck. So we went around on the opposite side of the road, the traffic going the other way, and got over the bridge. That was one heck of a drive.

Pete: I used to ask Pierre before I played a match—it didn’t matter if it was my brother or anyone—“Well, Pierre, what I am I going to do today? Do I attack his backhand?” He said, “Pete, one point at a time. No mistakes.”

That was absolutely true. It all depended on where the ball was hit. If it should be hit to the forehand, even if the guy had a good forehand, that was the proper shot.

ICE HOCKEYPete was a right wing on the Middlebury College team. He tried out for the 1960 U.S. Olympic team. Both men played on the St. Nicholas team for over a quarter of century. The C

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This page: Jimmy Bostwick

was adept at racquet sports.

Opposite page, from top:

Jimmy Bostwick on the court in

1975; the Bostwicks at a polo

match; Pete Bostwick, Jr.,

has enjoyed playing sports

throughout his life.

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St. Nick’s, the country’s oldest amateur squad, played many historic matches against collegiate teams. In December 1962, Jimmy scored the game-winner when the St. Nick’s beat Harvard. In the 1970s, Pete scrimmaged with the New York Islanders, showcasing skilled footwork.

Pete: There was no ice at Aiken Preperatory School. I went to St. Paul’s School when I was 15. I had never played hockey—I had only skated four or five times on the ponds at Christmas. I started on the seventh intramural hockey team. Second year, I was on the fifth. Third year, I made J.V. and, soon, varsity. Then, I went to Middlebury. Each year I got better and better. Those years you could start a little bit late and it didn’t matter. Now, if you don’t start playing at four years old and play in two or three different leagues for 10 months a year, it’s hard to make the team.

Jimmy: I wasn’t a very good hockey player but I got to play third line for the St. Nick’s. I guess we had a couple of good years. I got better because I got to play with all these great players. My feet are a size eight or an eight-and-a-half, but I used to cram myself into a pair of skates size five-and-a-half. Anything smaller than that is too much. You can hurt your feet.

RACQUETSBoth Pete and Jimmy won the Gold Racquets at Tuxedo in tennis and racquets in the same year, a feat they both pulled off twice. Pete won the U.S. Open in racquets in 1969 and 1970.

Jimmy: It is hard to win the Gold Racquets in both tennis and racquets if there are good fields in both. I came out of a cast one year to play—two days before the tournament started, I took off the cast I had for my dislocated elbow.

Someone said, “Those Bostwicks, my god, they’ve got to be the cleanest guys in town—they are always showering after some match.”

Pete: Both Jimmy and I did play an ice hockey game once in the middle of a tournament. They had the Open out at Tuxedo in the late ’60s. I beat Jimmy in the semifinals and, after we got through, we flew to Brown University in Providence in a small plane to play their varsity ice hockey team. Then we came back to Tuxedo, and I got into bed around three in the morning.

SQUASHPete won the U.S. 40s in squash in 1975 and the U.S. 45s in 1980. The 1975 win was remarkable, as he overcame a 0 to 2 deficit in the semis to longtime great Henri Salaun. Pete also reached the quarters of the U.S. Amateur twice in his late thirties. Jimmy coached squash at the Greenvale School on Long Island.

Pete: There is obviously an athletic gene that has helped us play various sports at a fairly decent level. But there is also a bad gene that certainly hurt our squash games. I had both of my hips replaced at 53. My son had both of his replaced at 46. My grandson had his hip shaved at 16. Basically, some of our genetics aren’t so good.

TENNISAt 18, Pete played at Forest Hills in the 1952 national tennis championships. He lost 6 to 0, 6 to 1, and 6 to 4 to Charles

Masterson in the first round. Pete won the New England scholastics as a schoolboy at St. Paul’s and captained the team at Middlebury College. Both brothers played at Longwood in the U.S. Father and Son.

Pete: Last winter, I played tennis with Jack Nicklaus. He’s got three grass courts at his home in Lost Tree Village in Florida. He plays quite a bit of tennis and you can see he’s a good athlete. He’s got an artificial hip but he runs better than I do now. He moves extremely well for having an artificial hip and he’s got a very good eye and a nice service motion, hits the ball very cleanly. This grass court I played on, it is the finest grass court I’ve ever played on. He has someone from Wimbledon come over and work on it and put it together. But he couldn’t have been nicer. I ended up playing a set with an amateur from the Meadow Club against Jack and a pro from Sleepy Hollow who was damned good. And we got bageled 6-love. They beat the heck out of us. u

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