SPRINGFIELD, N.J. -- It was raining on the night of Aug. 5, 1948, when a diminutive, disheveled man shuffled into a Hackensack, N.J., police station. The man had nothing left, nowhere else to go. He asked the sergeant, Ralph Pinot, if he could sleep in a prison cell to have shelter for the night. The sergeant obliged.
The man's name was Cyril Walker. He was the 1924 U.S. Open champion. The next morning, he was found dead, slumped over on a chair in that prison cell.
The official cause of death was listed as pleural pneumonia. He was 55 years old.