Gary Moran on a book that has the finest photographs of legendaryBen Hogan in action

If you want to treat yourself and impress your golfing friends then may we recommend a coffee-table book to cherish. The Hogan Mystique is a large and lavish production, edited by Martin Davis, founder of specialist publisher The American Golfer (www.theamericangolfer.com). Oh, that a dentist's waiting-room held such gems.

To give an idea of the scale, it is not inconceivable that you would miss a putt from the top left to the bottom right of one of its pages, a distance of 18 inches. The quality is less easily measured but just as readily appreciated when you get the book in your hands. The pages, the binding and, most importantly in this instance, the photographic reproduction are top class.

Davis set out to produce a series aimed at the top end of the market and when first published in 1994, The Hogan Mystique retailed at $60. While primarily a collection of photographs of Ben Hogan taken by Jules Alexander, it also includes lengthy essays on Hogan by Dave Anderson, Ben Crenshaw and Dan Jenkins.

The photographs are annotated by former US Open champion Ken Venturi, who was a good friend of Hogan and well qualified to comment on one of the most envied swings in the history of the game. Venturi's analysis provides an element of instruction but the real beauty of this book is in the photographs, which are all black-and-white.

It obviously helped Alexander that he had a strong interest in the game and went on to hold a single figure handicap at Westchester Country Club. When the US Open came to nearby Winged Foot in 1959 he spent much of the week on Hogan's trail.

The majority of the 72 photographs in the book, many of them over two pages, come from that event.

Every aspect of Hogan's swing is captured from the address to the waggle he considered so important to the back swing, his famous rip through the ball and the balanced finish.

In his essay, "The Hawk", Crenshaw declares his "lasting impression of Hogan was how he tore into and through each shot, with this power and force and authority and you knew that the ball had to obey his command and would streak like a laser to the target. I've never seen a ball hit like that, or heard shots that sounded like that before or since. That sound was Hogan's alone."

A noted golf historian and collector, Crenshaw judges the photographs to be "the finest ever taken of Hogan in action". New York Times columnist and Pulitzer Prize winner Dave Anderson has some good anecdotes in his contribution, "The Standards of The Man". Hogan, as chairman of his own equipment company, supervised product design and quality control. When the first batch of clubs arrived from the factory he ordered them junked. "But that's $100,000 worth of clubs," somebody said. "They're not good clubs," Hogan replied. "Throw them away."

His proprietary interest allowed him to put down Gary Player when the South African phoned with a query about the position of the hands at the top of the back swing. Hogan asked, "What clubs are you using now?" "Dunlop," said Player. "Then ask Mr Dunlop."

He wouldn't have wanted to bin this book which is available from www.amazon.com. The American Golfer have since produced a distinct volume in the same style, Ben Hogan - The Man Behind The Mystique. It has a lot to live up to but with more photos of Hogan and his contemporaries, more stats, new essays and more instruction it may be even better.

The Hogan Mystique

by Martin Davis