A TIE AT GOLF AND GAB
Hope and Crosby Tilt Around Course at Topeka
After "Clambake" in Kansas Capital, the two motor to Kansas City for Bob's War Bond Show tonight.
Kansas City Times, Monday, June 4, 1945Bob Hope called it a clambake, and one of the finest he had ever attended, but the event was scheduled as a Bing Crosby-Bob Hope golf exhibition, at the Topeka Country club yesterday afternoon.
The co-stars of the attraction were Betty Hicks, national women's golf champion, who was teamed with Hope; Babe Freese, Pacific Coast runner-up, Bing's partner, and Dick Metz, who played all four of them. The exhibition was witnessed by some 8,000 persons on the sidelines, on the greens, in trees, and perched on a high diving stand, atop the clubhouse.
CROSBY MAY APPEAR HERE
Following the match, Hope and Crosby motored to Kansas City for Hope's show for the Seventh War Loan drive at 8 o'clock tonight in the Arena of the Municipal Auditorium. Crosby was undecided whether he would be in the show. The remainder of the cast will arrive in Kansas City today. Hope and Crosby are staying at the Hotel Muehlebach.
In Topeka Hope and Crosby feuded their way around the course, playing excellent golf and making many wisecracks. The score remained a mystery as four or five holes were missed, but the two radio-screen stars averaged approximately forty each on the first nine holes. Hope refused to accept the score, since there was no certified public accountant present to audit the figures. All participants conceded on the eighteenth green that the event had ended in a tie.
Metz, a professional, matched his score against the lowest made by any of the other four on each hole.
"Bing's a fair golfer," Bob admitted. "He's a slow swinger and the ball doesn't go far, but it always gets there ahead of his horses."
Bing grudgingly admitted Bob, too, was a remarkable golfer, considering his age and infirmities.
RIDES A MOTORCYCLE
Early in the match Bob did a dance and Bing yodeled for the appreciative gallery. Hope grew tired after a few holes. Explaining that his ball had gone "so far that I can't see it," he talked a highway patrolman on a motorcycle into taking him to his next shot. He started out triumphantly on his ride across the course only to find the "beautiful shot" was firmly imbedded in a sandtrap.
Bing, sauntering along on foot, happily discovered Hope's plight and said, "Why, Bob! You've hit sand again."
"Oh, father, you were right," Hope moaned. "Oh, father, you were right."
A photographer crouched in the sandtrap in front and to the side of Hope to snap a picture of Bob's recovery shot. Bing said the photographer should be awarded a Purple Heart because he showed as much bravery as Commando Kelly. Hope extricated himself with a minimum of shots and a maximum of advice.
"Beautiful shot," Hope shouted, after Betty Hicks drove to the green. "How about threading a needle for me?"
Bing missed the ball on his tee shot.
"Oh, Harold, how fine," Hope said. "That was really a bad shot."
Hope was voluble in his sympathy to Bing's partner, repeatedly telling Babe Freese what an excellent golfer she was and how she could have won the game "if you had any assistance."
At the eighteenth hole the players expressed their appreciation to the crowd.
Bing must have a lot of relatives in town," Hope remarked.
Before the match, Hope and Crosby visited the patients at the Winter General hospital, and put on a show in one of the mess halls following a tour of the wards.
"Hello men," Hope announced, walking into one of the orthopedic wards. "I've brought my father along and he wants to sing."
THEY ARE GOOD FRIENDS
Bing accepted the introduction and explained that he and Bob were good friends. "There isn't anything I wouldn't do for Bob," he added.
"And there's nothing I wouldn't do for you," Bob replied.
"Yes, that's the way we go through life," Bing commented. "We never do anything for each other."
One man yelled out to Bing, "Hi, Frankie. Oh, I mean Bing."
"Bing wants to be fair to Frank Sinatra and really is broadminded on the subject," Bob explained.
"Why, Bing just told me that Sinatra's head is suing his body for non-support. Frankie's o.k. But he just received another letter from his blood bank that he is overdrawn again. Why, Bing was playing Sinatra a yo-yo match not long ago, and they had to call it off because the yo-yo was swinging Sinatra up and down."
The nurses were called "beautiful morale builders" by the entertainers. The men applauded loudly when Hope danced with one to the tune Crosby was singing.
PATIENTS ENJOYED VISIT
Col. Waldo B. Farnum, acting commanding officer of the hospital, said the men had been looking forward to the visit of Hope and Crosby. About 800 of the patients were able to attend the golf match and were honor guests of the Shawnee County War Memorial Fund committee, which sponsored it.
Hope does not plan any Kansas City appearances other than the bond show. His final broadcast of the season will be tomorrow night at the Sedalia, Mo, army air base and he plans to spend today going over the scripts for the stage and radio shows. Hope soon will leave for Germany to entertain the troops, and Crosby will go to Guam to entertain.