He was part John Wayne, part Jimmy Stewart and entirely a real American sporting hero.
Arnold Palmer was simply, as Raymond Chandler once wrote of James Bond, a man men wanted to be and women wanted to be with.
Dashing and debonair — whether on the fairways or in the cockpit of one of his many planes — he was at the same time unfailingly generous with both his time and his spirit.
Palmer was a hero not just for an elite country club sport, but a blue collar Steeltown champion who embodied the American Dream, rising from humble beginnings as the son of a Latrobe, Penn.