The legend of Gene Baum lives on

Somewhere in the heavens, and probably on a golf course, the late

Gene Baum is praising his former volunteer colleagues through Hoag

Hospital’s 552 Club.

None of this, the PGA Champions Tour’s Toshiba Senior Classic at

Newport Beach Country Club, would be quite the same, or perhaps even

possible, if it wasn’t for Baum, who, in his golden years, helped

transform a gags-and-giggles pro-am clambake into a highly respected

mini-tour event -- the Newport Classic Pro-Am.

The same core of volunteers, who operated the Newport Classic

(formerly the Crosby Southern Pro-Am) for 23 years as a fund-raiser

for Hoag, moved over to manage the Toshiba Classic six years ago and

have flourished like a fresh bouquet of roses since.

Baum, co-founder and organizer of some of the most successful

fund-raising efforts, died on June 25, 1996, at age 85, and,

unfortunately, didn’t get to see the Big Move in 1997, when the

Senior PGA Tour phoned for help and Hoag came to the rescue like a

wartime medic.

Along with Toshiba Senior Classic Co-Chairman Jake Rohrer, Baum

would travel every fall to the PGA Tour National Qualifying

Tournament and invite (i.e., recruit) players for the Newport Classic

Pro-Am in late January. It was an annual ritual, a pilgrimage that

formed and nurtured a strong relationship with the PGA Tour.

“We were really only one or two tournaments allowed to recruit

players at Q School,” said Rohrer, who was the guy PGA Tour official

Tim Crosby called in ’97 to take over the Toshiba Senior Classic,

thanks to a long relationship with the tour.

Baum, a man with a golden touch and twinkle in his eye, dedicated

his retirement life to the Newport Beach community and Hoag Hospital.

He made sure every golf pro who teed it up had a friend here.

“He was a true people lover,” his wife of 60 years, Phyllis, once

said.

Known for his straw hat and plus fours on the golf course, the

affable Baum, whose efforts were indispensable while his appeal was

priceless, could roar like a lion when necessary and always kept

matters in check during his countless hours of volunteering for the

Newport Classic Pro-Am, a precursor to the modern-day Toshiba Classic

with Hoag as the operating manager.

Organizers of both tournaments have had a reputation for taking

care of its players during tournament week. Their experience in

tournament hospitality services began in January 1975, when members

of the 552 Club launched the Crosby Southern Pro-Am.

“We had a very interesting relationship,” Rohrer said. “We were

personal friends. We were co-volunteers obviously for the [Newport

Classic], but he was a little more like a father figure to me. My dad

always lived on the East Coast, and I didn’t get to see him that

much, so Gene kind of filled that role for me. More than anything, we

were good friends, despite a substantial difference in age [about 33

years], and we worked well together.”

Baum, who spent his summers growing up on Balboa Island and later

retired there, also volunteered for key roles in other Hoag Hospital

fund-raisers, such as the 552 Club Stag Shoot, Bertram Yachts Tag &

Release Billfish Tournament and the Festival of Trees.

Baum, the 552 Club’s recipient of the prestigious Siracusa Award

in 1982, was a charter member of the Balboa Island Yacht Club,

founded in 1922, a club that teaches children ages 4-16 about boating and water safety.

For the Assistance League of Newport-Mesa, Baum dressed up as

Santa Claus each year and showered the children with gifts in the day

care center.

Born in Los Angeles in 1911, Baum lived in the Arcadia area for

many years working as a general manager of Coast Envelope, a division

of Hammermill Paper.

Baum’s son, Steve, and daughter-in-law, Cathy, have upheld the

tradition and volunteered the last three years at the Toshiba Senior

Classic, which enjoyed another banner year in 2002 in charitable

giving.

Hoag, the lead charity of the Toshiba Classic, is about to take

the national stage. The Newport Beach hospital will be featured in a

30-second public service announcement that will run prominently

during national TV programming, including PGA Tour and PGA Champions

Tour telecasts.

The Toshiba Senior Classic has been the charitable flag bearer on

the PGA Champions Tour. In the past five years, the tournament has

raised more than $4.7 million for over 25 different charities, the

most on the Champions Tour.

The Toshiba Senior Classic was the first Champions Tour event to

raise $1 million for charity in a single year (2000), and last year

became the first to raise $1 million in three consecutive years.

In 1998, after running its first senior tour event, Hoag was

awarded the tour’s inaugural Charity of the Year award after raising

more than $700,000 through the Toshiba Classic. Could you imagine the

twinkle in Baum’s eye after seeing those figures?