Golf Central

On December 21, 82 years, thousands of miles and personalities apart, two of golf's greatest champions were born. In 1892, the great Walter Hagen was born in Rochester, New York; and in 1974, fellow Golf Hall of Famer Karrie Webb was born in Ayr, Queensland, Australia.

About the only things the two titans of the game had in common, however, was the game, their Hall of Fame status, and stacks of major championships.

Hagen, golf's superstar of the Roaring '20s, was one of the most flamboyant figures to grace the game. As Stephen Goodwin of Golf Magazine said, Hagen "made pots of money and spent it with legendary abandon." Hagen, who died in '69, racked up 40 PGA Tour titles and 11 major championships. Hagen's flash clothes, partying lifestyle and playboy reputation would have fit in well with these modern times - however, except for a few very good recent movie portrayals, we still tend to think of him in black-and-white.

Webb, on the other hand, is a modern star with a modern game suited to this technicolour age. She won so often and early on the LPGA Tour that her Hall of Fame status was assured five years before she was eligible by seniority. Webb currently owns 35 LPGA wins, including seven majors, many of them earned in a head-to-head archrivalry with Annika Sorenstam. But unlike Hagen, Webb is not known for typical Aussie candour. She has been called the "Garbo of Golf" due to her and intense privacy and lack of desire for the limelight. "I do have a personality," Webb said. "But I can't be somebody that I'm not." ...

But today is obviously a good day to be born if you want to be a major champ, so if you're a parent of a newborn today, don't wait too long for those golf lessons ...

And in 1620, the first permanent European colony in America was established when William Bradford and his Mayflower pilgrims landed on what is known as Plymouth Rock in Massachusetts ...

And it was a puzzling day in 1913 when readers of the New York World newspaper opened up their morning rag to find the first published crossword puzzle. ... Twenty-four years later, with the opening of the Disney film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the names of the dwarves would become a frequent crossword clue ...

It was also on this day, in the year 69, that Rome marked its Year of the Four Emperors - with Vespasian following Galba, Otho and Vitellius to the top dog's spot during a year of huge intrigue in the Empire (Galba and Vitellius were murdered, and Otho offed himself before anyone else could get him) ...

That said, it's fortuna dies natalis!, as they said in ancient Rome, to left-wing actress Jane Fonda (70); to "Mr Telecaster" Albert Lee (64); massive film superstar and 4.9-handicapper Samuel L. Jackson (59); Greg Norman's new squeeze and tennis great Chrissie Evert (53); and "24" star and Hollywood bad boy Keifer Sutherland (41).

It also would have been a birthday for Joseph Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili, better known as Stalin ("made of steel, b. 1878), who was both a gifted statesman and a ruthless dictator in the Soviet Union, had he not purged himself from humanity in 1953.