Product Description

John Montague was a boisterous enigma. In the 1930s, he was called “the world's greatest golfer” by famed sportswriter Grantland Rice. He could drive the ball 300 yards and more, or he could chip it across a room into a highball glass. He played golf with everyone from Howard Hughes and W. C. Fields to Babe Ruth and Bing Crosby. Yet strangely, he never entered a professional tournament or allowed himself to be photographed. Then, a Time magazine photographer snapped his picture with a telephoto lens and police quickly recognized Montague as a fugitive with a dark secret.

From the glamour of 1930s Hollywood, to John Montague's extraordinary skill and triumphs on the golf course, to the shady world of Adirondack rumrunners and the most controversial, star-studded court trial of its day, The Mysterious Montague captures a man and an era with extraordinary color, verve, and energy.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #280305 in Books
• Published on: 2009-05-05
• Released on: 2009-05-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 336 pages

From Publishers Weekly
When John Montague died alone on May 25, 1972, age 69, in a fleabag hotel in Studio City, Calif., his body went unclaimed for a week. Hardly a fitting end for a man who once rubbed shoulders with Bing Crosby, Richard Arlen, Oliver Hardy and the other Hollywood swells who golfed, drank and caroused at the Lakeside Country Club in L.A. In the capable hands of bestselling sportswriter Montville (Ted Williams), Montague's is a quintessentially American story of a man from a hardscrabble background who found himself in the glamorous, easy-money world of Hollywood. But Montague had a past that caught up to him. Having fled a charge of armed robbery in upstate New York, Montague was brought back in 1937 to stand trial, and though he got off, his life quickly unraveled. Hyped by the great sportswriter Grantland Rice (who called him a golfer who would be a wrecking whirlwind in any amateur championship and on a par with any pro) and other newshounds, Montague struggled through a series of increasingly embarrassing attempts to go legit on the golf circuit. An entertaining read for the golf lit completist, this doesn't rise to the level of compulsion for the average reader. (May)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Review
PRAISE FOR NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR LEIGH MONTVILLE

TED WILLIAMS

“Exceptional. Montville on Ted Williams is can’t-miss, one of America’s best sportswriters weighing in on one of the last century’s most intriguing figures. A great read.”
—Chicago Tribune

“In Ted Williams, Leigh Montville reaches a threshold even the mighty Williams could never touch: perfection. The beauty of Montville’s work is that it is not a baseball book, per se, so much as the life and times of an oft perplexing, always fascinating man.”
—Newsday

“Montville is refreshingly nonjudgmental about his superstar subject. First-rate biography.”
—Los Angeles Times Book Review

“Crisp analogies and astute observations, combined with a fluid writing style, are Leigh Montville’s strengths in this definitive biography of the Splendid Splinter.”
—Tampa Tribune

THE BIG BAM

“[A] vivid, intimate account. Montville’s unique voice … makes old yarns seem new.”
—Sports Illustrated

“Montville is a wonderful storyteller and Ruth’s story, from Baltimore street urchin to international celebrity is indisputably amazing … a fascinating tale, alternately happy and sad, and always artfully written.”
—Chicago Tribune

“The best Ruth biography to date … [Montville’s] adroit organization of the historical material—enhanced by newly studied archival material and oral history transcripts, together with his flair for marshalling undisputed facts that are intertwined with plausible speculations—has produced an engaging, entertaining, and eminently readable biography.”
—Library Journal (starred review)

Review
“A great tale from one of our era's best storytellers.”
—The New York Times

“In Montville's skillful hands, Montague's story becomes an epic drama about a potential hero undermined by his troubled past.” —The Boston Globe

“A well-paced ride.”
—The Washington Post

“Hollywood missed this story, but the screen's loss is Montville's—and his readers'—gain.”
—Sports Illustrated

Customer Reviews

Links Braggart Laid Low
LaVerne Moore was one of the more colorful figures in the world of golf in the 1930's and Leigh Montville tells his tale in all its boisterous glory in The Mysterious Montague, A True Tale of Hollywood, Golf, and Armed Robbery.

John Montague, as Moore was better known, was a trick shot artist who could chip a ball into a highball glass or under the sash of a partially-opened window across the room. He reputedly knocked a bird off a power line from 170 yards and consistently drove the ball over 300 yards with a specially-made oversized driver the weighed twice as much as the standard club of its time. Most famously, he once beat Bing Crosby while playing only with a rake, a shovel, and a baseball bat.

Montague had a secret, though. It was why he never allowed himself to be photographed and reputedly why he never entered any professional events. When that secret was revealed, it led to a sensational trial in upstate New York that turned into a celebrity-laden media fest. The secret is told in the first chapter of the book: Montague was wanted under his real name, LaVerne Moore, for the armed robbery of a roadside restaurant in the Adirondacks in 1930. The trial and its aftermath is an interesting window into the media world of the time.

Montville entertains the reader with tales of Montague's prowess, although it's obvious many of them grew to legendary status mainly through the re-telling such feats engender. He also gives us a good look at the celebrities who flocked to Montague's cause. Babe Ruth, Bing Crosby, Oliver Hardy, W.C. Fields, Howard Hughes, Babe Didrickson Zaharias, and many more were tied to Montague one way or another. Sportswriter Grantland Rice was his biggest fan.

The end of the book, which chronicles Montague's late-in-life attempt to break into the ranks of professional tournament golf, may be of the greatest interest to players of the game. Weakened by too many years of Hollywood parties and lack of practice, Montague was a miserable failure in his attempts to compete with PGA stars, who had disdained him from the start.

Dave Donelson, author of Heart of Diamonds: A Novel of Scandal, Love and Death in the Congo

The Mysterious Montague - An Enjoyable Book
The title of Leigh Montville's new book tells you a lot about the story without ever having to read a page. John Montague played golf and schmoozed with some of the most famous of the 1930's Hollywood celebrities. However, something in his personal life would eventually turn his world totally around. This book will probably not win any literary awards, but it is entertaining, amusing, and at times quite unbelievable. Golfers will love it, non-golfers will enjoy it.

Legend Discovery, then Evaporation
Amazing tale of a mysterious Hollywood golfer and friend of the stars who no one seemed to know his past, due to robbery gone bad in native NY.

The reader is instantly hooked with the robbery account at the beginning, then moving on to his legendary exploits in golf and feats of strength around Hollywood country club set the likes of Olver Hardy to Bing Crosby. The man resisted any photos until sportswriter Grantland Rice gets the man too much press in newspaper story which eventually results in secret photos of the man in national magazine. The photo of him on the cover reminds me much of a young Jackie Gleason and one of my dad's brothers. The NY authorities see this picture, and go to California to have the man arrested and brought back for trial seven years after its the alleged law breaking.

After the trial, unfortunately now in freedom, Montague does not perform up to his legendary status, which gives me dual emotions: sorry that he couldn't and not sorry that his loose behavior prevent it. The likes of John Wayne, Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb play in his fascinating life.

Great read for golfer, sports aficianado and anyone else liking a good read of Americana sports/Hollywood history. Montville is a great writer who holds your interest.