The Open Championship, often referred to as The Open or the British Open, is the oldest golf tournament in the world, and one of the most prestigious. Founded in 1860, it was originally held annually at Prestwick Golf Club in Scotland. Later the venue rotated between a select group of coastal links golf courses in the United Kingdom. It is organised by The R&A.
Colin Stuart Montgomerie, OBE is a Scottish professional golfer. He has won a record eight European Tour Order of Merit titles, including a streak of seven consecutive from 1993 to 1999. He has won 31 European Tour events, the most of any British player, placing him fourth on the all-time list of golfers with most European Tour victories.
The European Tour, currently titled as the DP World Tour for sponsorship reasons, and legally the PGA European Tour or the European Tour Group, is the leading men's professional golf tour in Europe. The organisation also operates the European Senior Tour and the developmental Challenge Tour; the second tier of men's professional golf in Europe. The tour's headquarters are at the Wentworth Club in Virginia Water, Surrey, England. The European Tour was established by the British-based Professional Golfers' Association through the 1970s, and responsibility was transferred to an independent PGA European Tour organisation in 1984.
Gleneagles Hotel is a hotel near Auchterarder, Scotland. It was commissioned by the Caledonian Railway and opened in 1924. The bandleader Henry Hall performed at the hotel before the Second World War during which it served as a military hospital. There are three tournament-standard golf courses in the grounds and the hotel was redeveloped for the 40th Ryder Cup in 2014. Significant conferences at the hotel have included the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting 1977 and the 31st G8 summit in July 2005. It is a Category B listed building.
Neil Chapman Coles, MBE is an English professional golfer. Coles had a successful career in European golf, winning 29 important tournaments between 1956 and 1982. After reaching 50, he won a further 14 important Seniors tournaments between 1985 and 2002, winning his final European Seniors Tour event at the age of 67. He also played in eight Ryder Cup matches between 1961 and 1977.
Thomas Bjørn is a Danish professional golfer who plays on the European Tour. He is the most successful Danish golfer to have played the game having won fifteen tournaments worldwide on the European Tour. In 1997 he also became the first Dane to qualify for a European Ryder Cup team. He captained the winning European side at the 2018 Ryder Cup.
The Betfred British Masters is a professional golf tournament. It was founded in 1946 as the Dunlop Masters and was held every year up to 2008, except for 1984. Dunlop's sponsorship ended in 1982, and the name sponsor changed frequently thereafter, with the words "British Masters" usually also in the tournament's official name. The tournament was not held from 2009 to 2014 but returned to the schedule in 2015.
The Scottish PGA Championship is a golf tournament played annually in Scotland since 1907. For many years the event was called the Scottish Professional Championship. It is the flagship event on the "Tartan Tour", the PGA Tour in Scotland's schedule. The 2016 event was the 100th staging of the Championship and the final event on the 2016 Tartan Tour schedule.
Peter Arthur Oosterhuis was an English professional golfer and broadcaster. He played on the European circuit from 1969 to 1974, winning 10 tournaments and taking the Harry Vardon Trophy for heading the Order of Merit for four consecutive seasons from 1971 to 1974. From 1975 he played on the PGA Tour, winning the Canadian Open in 1981. Oosterhuis was twice runner-up in the Open Championship, in 1974 and 1982. Later he became a golf analyst on TV, initially in Europe and then in the United States. In 2015, he announced that he had Alzheimer's disease.
John Robert Maurice Jacobs, OBE was an English professional golfer, coach, entrepreneur, writer and administrator. He was inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame in 2000.
Brian George Charles Huggett, is a Welsh professional golfer. He won 16 events on the European circuit between 1962 and 1978, including two after the formal start of the European Tour in 1972. In 1968 he won the Harry Vardon Trophy for leading the Order of Merit and he was in third place in 1969, 1970 and 1972. He won 10 times on the European Seniors Tour between 1992 and 2000, including the 1998 Senior British Open.
Patrick Christopher "Christy" O'Connor was an Irish professional golfer. He was one of the leading golfers on the British and Irish circuit from the mid-1950s.
Peter Joseph Butler was an English professional golfer. He was one of the leading British golfers of the 1960s and early 1970s. He won a number of important tournaments including the 1963 PGA Close Championship and the 1968 French Open. He played in four Ryder Cup matches between 1965 and 1973 and three times in the World Cup. He played in the Open Championship 23 times, with two top-10 finishes, and seven successive times in the Masters from 1964 to 1970.
Malcolm Edward Gregson was an English professional golfer. After a promising start to his career as an amateur and assistant professional, he had one exceptional year, 1967, when he won the Harry Vardon Trophy and played in the Ryder Cup, but had only limited success afterwards. After reaching 50 he played on the European Senior Tour, winning five times.
The Penfold Tournament was a golf tournament on the British PGA tournament circuit. Since the circuit later evolved into the European Tour, the tournament is recognised as an official European Tour event from 1972. It was played between 1932 and 1935, and from 1946 to 1974 at a variety of courses in the United Kingdom. The tournament was sponsored by Penfold Golf and was often played at coastal resorts, whose councils shared the costs. In 1974, Penfold were taken over by Colgate-Palmolive and continued their sponsorship through the Penfold PGA Championship from 1975 to 1977.
The 2001 European Tour, titled as the 2001 PGA European Tour, was the 30th season of the European Tour, the main professional golf tour in Europe since its inaugural season in 1972.
Gordon Alexander Caygill is an English professional golfer. He had considerable early success as a young professional from 1960 to 1963 but then had a lean period, partly due to a stomach ulcer. He made a comeback in the late 1960s, winning two tournaments in early 1969, and gained a place in the 1969 Ryder Cup team.
Lionel Platts was an English professional golfer. He finished 7th in the PGA Order of Merit in both 1964 and 1965. He played in the 1965 Ryder Cup.
Hedley W. Muscroft was an English professional golfer. He played regularly on the European circuit and later on the European Tour when it started in 1972. He won the 1970 Classic International and played in The Open Championship 16 times with a best finish of 18th place in 1967.
William Gordon Cunningham was a Scottish professional golfer. He won the 1969 Scottish Professional Championship. He played 11 times in the Open Championship, making the cut six times including five times in succession between 1965 and 1969.
Robert McIntyre 
