AIKEN -- Each spring, when blooming azaleas and pink dogwoods herald the arrival of Masters Week, Phyllis Hale readies her Aiken home for its annual invasion of welcome guests.
``They're mostly family,'' she said with a laugh. ``There's my daughter and son-in-law from Mount Pleasant, a brother here, a daughter there. It all adds up.''
The visitors, sharing a love for golf and a desire to stroll the coveted Augusta National Golf Club course, take turns using Mrs. Hale's two Masters Tournament patron's admission badges -- and they don't pay a penny over their issue price.
The patron list for the exclusive golf tournament is closely guarded.
Augusta National won't even confirm the number of patrons, which popular mythology tallies at 40,000 nationally. But as a club patron for 35 years, Mrs. Hale said she would never consider selling her badges even though she knows she could.
``It wouldn't be right,'' she said. ``It's against the rules.''
Instead, she prefers to arrange trips to the tour nament for friends and family, occasionally -- and grudgingly -- allowing them to help repay the $100 issue price of a badge to the fourday Masters Tournament.
But not a penny more, although she's very much aware that her badges could be sold for $5,000 or more each.
Compared with many patrons who scalp their tickets to brokers who feed the secondary ticket market, Mrs. Hale is the moral beacon of the Masters Tournament. But she's quick to point out that she's neither unique nor alone.
``I don't do anything special or different,'' she said. ``Lots of other people who get tickets do the same thing, but you don't always hear much about them.''
Her generosity has even earned her a special nickname.
``They call me St. Phyllis of the Tickets,'' she said with a laugh. ``It's like St. Francis of Assisi (the Italian saint renowned for benevolence). It's something my son thought up.''
Her son, Steve Hale -- a perennial golf fan himself -- has enjoyed being able to attend the Masters, at least for a day here and there, most of his life.
``It brings the whole family together,'' he said. ``Sort of like Christmas in April.''
If his family didn't have Masters badges, it would be a great loss. And he'd never pay scalpers' prices.
Fortunately, the Aiken man -- after two decades of waiting -- learned two years ago he'd moved sufficiently up the patrons waiting list to receive two badges himself.
Like his mother, he'd never sell his badges. ``I'd be crazy,'' he said.
Mrs. Hale, by the way, once received four badges, a holdover from the bygone days when patrons were urged to buy as many as they could afford to help support the then-fledgling tournament.
But then things changed.
``Back in '71 or '72, they sent a letter out, pleading for people who didn't need all their tickets to give some up so others could go,'' Mrs. Hale said. ``We gave up two.''
Today, she wishes she still had four -- not just two.
``But I still wouldn't sell them off,'' she said.
Masters fan keeps badges in the family
