In 1994, Jack Nicklaus sat in the same golf cart as Oakmont member Robert Beitle. Nicklaus was sweating so much due to the 96-degree heat that he looked like he was going to die.
But Beitle was in a pickle — he couldn’t do his volunteer job of shuttling players back and forth from the locker room and driving range. He had two guys right in front of his cart that had far too many beers, and they simply refused to get out of the way of Beitle’s and Nicklaus’ cart.
The frustrated Nicklaus didn’t want Beitle to have to wait for the two intoxicated men.
“Don’t stop. Keep going. Don’t stop. Keep going,” Nicklaus kept muttering to Beitle.
Beitle couldn’t have been in a worse position.
“I thought, if I run over these guys, I’m going to kill them,” Beitle said. “And Nicklaus is going to kill me, because it’s just terrible here [in the heat].”
Luckily, the situation calmed down, and the two men got nudged enough out of the way that Beitle finished his job of dropping off Nicklaus at the locker room with no difficulty.
This is one of the many stories that Beitle has from his history of volunteering at the U.S. Open at Oakmont. This year is Beitle’s seventh time working as a volunteer at Oakmont and fifth time doing so as a member of the Oakmont Country Club.
This year, Beitle is working in the member services tent. His job is to help with the hospitality for Oakmont members by giving them advice and answering any questions they may have about the event, which is much simpler and less stressful than shuttling professional golfers around drunk spectators.
But Beitle has done it all while volunteering at the U.S. Open — he’s put name tags on the caddies’ bibs in the 2007 U.S. Open, worked the scoreboard in 1962, worked as a course marshal and even was a ball spotter one year.
In every job he’s worked, he’s watched some incredible tournaments at Oakmont. He saw Nicklaus win his first-ever Major Championship while the Pittsburgh crowd jeered at him throughout the round, calling him “Fat Jack,” because they wanted the hometown kid, Arnold Palmer, to win.
Beitle witnessed Johnny Miller’s iconic 63 in the final round of the 1973 U.S. Open to win the Major Championship. He watched Oakmont’s club professional, Bob Ford, become the last club professional to make the cut at their home club in the 1983 U.S. Open.
He allegedly saw a player quit after eight holes in the 1994 U.S. Open because the heat was too much for the player to bear. And he witnessed Ángel Cabrera win in 2007 with the highest over-par U.S. Open win of the 21st century, with a score of 5-over-par, tying the 5-over-par victory by Geoff Ogilvy at Winged Foot Golf Club in the previous year.
Whatever iconic moment you can think of happening at Oakmont in its past six U.S. Open Championships, Beitle has witnessed it firsthand. Now, over 60 years since his first time volunteering at the U.S. Open, he and the members are worried about the players overpowering the course and not struggling as they had in every other U.S. Open at Oakmont. But he hopes that won’t end up the case because of the rough Oakmont has ready for the players.
“The only reason now that Oakmont can possibly outlast these professionals is because of the rough,” Beitle said.
Beitle doesn’t want to see under-par rounds, and the players know members like Beitle want to see carnage.
“Anything close to par is what [the members] want here,” Xander Schauffele said during his media availability. “The members absolutely love their property, and the members absolutely want it to be over par. I know what they’re rooting for.”