Completed Edition

1973 PGA Championship

PGA Championship August 9–August 12, 1973

Canterbury Golf Club hosted the PGA Championship in August 1973. Jack Nicklaus won by four strokes, but the Club’s account also remembers the people carrying the bags: every player in the field was paired with a local caddie.¹⁴

Results

Published results

Recorded score

Won byJack Nicklaus
277
Runner-upBruce Crampton
281

Venue

Primary venueCanterbury Golf Club
Hosted by Canterbury Golf Club

Canterbury’s Local Caddies

Canterbury’s caddie master, Mike Kiely, organized a blind draw for the assignments. The Club identifies this as the last PGA Championship to use local caddies throughout the field. It names member Dr. Dan Breitenbach as Tom Weiskopf’s caddie and recalls that professionals from Nicklaus to Arnold Palmer and Sam Snead relied on Canterbury’s own people that week.¹

Nicklaus opened with 72, then added two rounds of 68. Canterbury remembers two contrasting Sunday recoveries: a low, fading long iron out of the trees at thirteen to save par, and a high eight-iron from the rough at fifteen that set up a birdie. His closing 69 produced 277. Bruce Crampton was second at 281.¹⁴

The victory was celebrated as Nicklaus’s fourteenth major title, passing Bobby Jones’s record. That comparison included Nicklaus’s U.S. Amateur victories in 1959 and 1961. Canterbury was his twelfth professional major, a distinction that matters when comparing this milestone with his eventual record of eighteen.¹²³

Nearby editions

Sources and record notes

Archive note

The 1973 edition was won by Jack Nicklaus. Verified venue assignments are published in this record.

Record sources

2026 PGA Championship Media Guide
- 1973 PGA Championship · Championship identity
  The official Media Guide directly enumerates the 55th playing, champion, Canterbury Golf Course site, and its year-page date span. The Guide narrative’s full venue and the Winners register’s Canterbury G.C. control over the structured History record’s misspelled Cantebury value.
  Verified 2026-08-20
Canterbury Golf Club: A Century of Championship Golf
- Canterbury Golf Club
  The Club’s Strong/Way course history explicitly identifies the 1973 PGA Championship in its continuing course chronology.
  Verified 2026-11-12
PGA official Championship result
- Jack Nicklaus
  The official detailed result and four published rounds corroborate the regulation total and relative score. Playoff status is checked against the Guide playoff table and detailed tied scores.
  Verified 2026-09-10
PGA official Championship finalist record
- Bruce Crampton
  Guide page 5 corroborates the finalist identity; the detailed official History supplies the explicit stroke total and relative score. No playoff flag is asserted.
  Verified 2026-10-23

Sources for this history

Canterbury Golf Club: Our HistoryCanterbury Golf Club
1973 entry: local caddie draw, Sunday shots and the championship result.
Consulted 2026-10-16
Jack Nicklaus: Playing Career TimelineNicklaus Companies
1971, 1973 and 1975 results and career milestones.
Consulted 2026-10-16
U.S. Amateur ChampionsUnited States Golf Association
1959 and 1961 Nicklaus entries; 1970 Wadkins, Kite and Waverley entry in the stroke-play era.
Consulted 2026-10-16
1973 PGA Championship LeaderboardPGA of America
Round-by-round scores and final totals.
Consulted 2026-10-16