With The Masters just around Amen Corner, many friends and neighbors from Mount Pleasant are either headed to Augusta, Georgia, to watch the tournament in-person or are planning to catch it on TV. Off the course is the inspiring story of chef James Clark Jr., who with determination and a desire to help people, became a legend not just at Augusta National but around the world.
In 1931, legendary golfer Bobby Jones and financier Clifford Roberts purchased a 365-acre commercial nursery in Augusta, Georgia, for $70,000 and enlisted help from the acclaimed English landscaper Alister MacKenzie to transform the property into what would become one of the most prestigious golf courses in the world, Augusta National Golf Club. When the partners opened the world-class 18-hole course in 1933, members celebrated with the Augusta National Invitation Tournament.
The event was so successful that by the next year, Jones launched the championship that is known today as The Masters. Since then, the tournament has been held annually every first full week of April from Thursday through Sunday.
To emulate the level of talent that the event attracted, Roberts changed the name of the tournament to the “Masters of Golf” in 1939. Prizes included money – today worth several million dollars – a gold medal and a lifetime membership to the club. In 1949, the tradition of the green jacket was established and in 1961, the custom of engraving the winner’s name on the silver Masters trophy was initiated.
For decades, the club’s culture reflected an all-white male membership and until 1983, its caddies were all Black. The tournament didn’t see its first Black player until Lee Elder qualified in 1975. It wasn’t until 1990 that the first Black member, Ron Townsend, was invited to join. On Aug. 20, 2012, the club’s first female members, former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and financier Darla Moore, were inducted.
The First of His Kind
Off the course, the club’s culinary scene from the early 1970s through the late 1990s was greatly influenced by Clark, who worked his way up to become the first Black chef to run the kitchen at Augusta National.
After graduating from high school in 1958, Clark left his hometown of Holly Hill, South Carolina, where job opportunities were scarce. He took a position as a dishwasher in the kitchen of the Kanu Dining Room at the historic Whiteface Inn in Lake Placid, New York. Under the tutelage of Italian chef Gino Pirell, Clark worked his way up to sous chef.
In 1970, he was promoted to executive chef. During his tenure there, Clark fell in love with Minnie Gilliard, a colleague who, by chance, was also from South Carolina. They married on March 28, 1962.
Clark’s path then led him to serve as sous chef at the Breakers Hotel in Palm Beach, Florida. With two sons Stanley and Greg in tow, the Clarks moved into the luxurious resort. From there, the family traveled seasonally and lived in the properties where the chef worked.
For Clark, golfing was a big part of that experience and he encouraged his sons to excel at the sport. Greg explained, “Even if Stanley and I didn’t want to play, we had to get in at least 18 holes a day. We would start with the front nine before lunch and the back nine after. It was just a way of life.”
Clearing The Plate
In the early 1970s, Augusta National’s chairman Roberts recruited Clark to take on a position as a second chef. According to Golf Digest, Clark’s first task in his new role was to prepare Roberts’ preferred dinner “roast leg of lamb, little oven-browned potatoes and carrots half-cooked to stay crunchy.” Clark nailed it – Roberts cleared his plate and that night, the chef embarked on a career that spanned three decades at the club.
Impressed with Clark’s talent, Roberts invited friends from New York to experience the chef’s delicious fare. For dessert, the chairman ordered pound cake, an option that was not on the menu. Clark, who was not a baker, didn’t know how to make it, especially in a pinch. Thinking on his feet, the resourceful chef dashed across the street to Kroger where he bought the Sara Lee version and brought it back to warm up in the oven before presenting Roberts and his friends with what became his signature “secret recipe pound cake.”
“If You Love It, You Know It”
In 1976, Clark was promoted to executive chef. Club members and their guests savored the soul food he prepared such as: tomato soup, collard green soup, corn muffins, chilled shrimp with cocktail sauce, chicken salad, T-bone steak, ribeye, filet mignon, prime rib, pork chops, baked or fried chicken and an assortment of seasonal vegetables harvested from the grounds’ gardens. Yet Clark never wrote down any of the recipes, according to Greg, as that would have been a sign of weakness. As the chef’s philosophy was “if you love it, you know it,” his staff also had to memorize the ingredients and quantities.
Nathaniel Wearing, who worked with Clark for more than two decades, traveled with him from Lake Placid to the Breakers to Augusta. Wearing, whose career at the club spanned 29 years, from 1984-2013, and 34 Masters’ tournaments, recounted, “Not only did members love the traditional Southern comfort menu, but celebrities, sitting presidents and dignitaries from all over the world – as far away as Australia, Italy, France and England – had heard about Chef’s (Clark’s) cuisine and traveled to Augusta to try it.”
Such VIPs included President George H.W. Bush, Peyton Manning and his family and Michael Jordan. When he learned that Jordan was at the club to play golf, Clark went to his cottage to meet him one morning and they chatted for a bit. When he asked Jordan what he would like for breakfast, he responded that he was a “country boy” and wanted grits, eggs, bacon and ham. Chef added that when he shook Jordan’s hand, it was so big it almost covered half of his arm.
Over the decades, Wearing and Clark prepared the annual Champions Dinner, a tradition where the previous year’s Masters winner hosts a feast for Masters officials, past winners and guests. Two such milestones they executed were when Tiger Woods won his first Masters in 1997 and in 1998 when he hosted his first dinner.
Wearing said that with no room for error while serving the world’s elite, he and Clark managed to have fun with their work. He added that working alongside Clark in the most prestigious resorts along the East Coast was iconic, considering that they both came from the same small town in South Carolina with few career options and no culinary education. He expressed his gratitude for the opportunity to grow a successful career with one of the most exclusive clubs in the world and to share many life experiences with Clark.
Outside the kitchen, Clark enjoyed playing golf at courses and in tournaments across the region. Greg said, “No matter where we were playing, Chef (Clark) was never expected to pay – he could have 10 guys with him and the whole group was welcome to join at no charge.”
To avoid a two-hour commute each way from Augusta to the house in Holly Hill, Clark lived in a cottage on the grounds. On his days off and during summer breaks, he loved being at home with Minnie, their sons and an addition to the family, their daughter Terra.
A Tradition Like No Other
Each year during The Masters, Stanley and Greg came to Augusta National to stay with Clark and help in the kitchen before watching the tournament, while Terra, who had no interest in the game, stayed home with her mom. Greg recalled that over the eight days leading up to and during the championship, Clark worked 16 hours a day. “He wouldn’t get home until 1 or 1:30 in the morning to have a quick shower and sleep for a couple hours before going back to the kitchen. It was his ritual.”
Between 5:30-6 a.m., the boys were up and ready for Clark to come back and pick them up in the golf cart. “He had a loud, heavy voice – you couldn’t mistake it for anyone else,” Greg laughed. “He’d call out for us and we’d head over to the club to do whatever was needed so we could go out to the course and pick the best spot for watching the tournament. We were up so early that no one else would be out there yet except the landscapers.”
Greg, who called his dad “Chef” from a very young age, said that Clark loved the responsibility for what he did and never walked away from long hours or the demands of the job. Clark’s commitment never faltered because he believed an honest day’s work would bring about longevity. That, and “He felt he was put on this earth to share love through food with all walks of life. Everybody loved him.”
Greg’s sister Terra added, “Daddy instilled in us that you have to respect everybody, no matter what they have or don’t have. He treated the CEO the way he treated the janitor. And he always put others before himself.”
For example, Terra said, when the power was out after Hurricane Hugo in 1989, Clark cooked the best food – even steak – on the gas grill and served the entire neighborhood breakfast, lunch and dinner for four straight days.
Terra added that Clark spent a great deal of time in the kitchen whenever he was home. Her favorite was his collard greens and fried egg sandwich with Duke’s Mayo. “It was perfect every time,” she said.
For Clark’s oldest son Stanley, Chef’s sauteed seabass was the best. “It melted in your mouth – I have yet to taste fish that good again,” he said.
In 2002, Clark passed away unexpectedly. His legacy, synonymous with husband, father, friend, chef and golfer, lives on in memoriam as a true champion beyond the kitchen and the game he loved to play.
“It’s one thing to honor Chef on Father’s Day or his birthday,” Greg concluded. “But the week of The Masters always hits home. Somehow, though, we get through it together.”
Leave a Reply