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MASTERS ’26: Key anniversaries over the years at Augusta National

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MASTERS ’26: Key anniversaries over the years at Augusta National


AUGUSTA, Ga. — A look at some of the anniversaries this year at the Masters:

75 years ago (1951)

Winner: Ben Hogan

Score: 70-72-70-68—280

Margin: 2 shots

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Prize: $3,000

Runner-up: Skee Riegel

Key to win: Hogan started the final round one shot behind Riegel and Sam Snead and shot 68 without making a bogey.

In this April 12, 1976 file photo, Jack Nicklaus, right, assists Raymond Floyd in putting on his green jacket after Floyd won the Masters Golf Championship at Augusta, Ga. Credit: AP/Anonymous

Noteworthy: Hogan won his second major after his near-fatal car accident. The following year, he wrote a letter to Augusta National co-founder Cliff Roberts suggesting a dinner for all the Masters champions.

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AP story: “Icicle-nerved Ben Hogan added a sensational flourish to one of the great comeback sagas in sports Sunday when he won his first Masters golf championship with a near-record 280. The gristly little man from Texas subdued Augusta National’s treacherous acres with a grim and meticulous last round 68, four under par golf that burned off all opposition. The 38-year-old National Open champion, winner of that crown twice and the PGA as many times, thus completed his slam of major American pro championships.”

50 years ago (1976)

Winner: Raymond Floyd

Score: 65-66-70-70—271

Tiger Woods reacts to his birdie putt on the 18th...

Tiger Woods reacts to his birdie putt on the 18th hole after winning the 2001 Masters at the Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, Ga., Sunday, April 8, 2001. Credit: AP/DOUG MILLS

Margin: 8 shots

Prize: $40,000

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Runner-up: Ben Crenshaw

Key to the win: Floyd made birdie or eagle on every par 5 through 54 holes in building an eight-shot lead. He tied the 72-hole record held by Jack Nicklaus.

Noteworthy: Floyd joined Craig Wood, Arnold Palmer and Nicklaus as the only wire-to-wire winners of the Masters. There would not be another one until Jordan Spieth in 2015.

AP story: “Ray Floyd — never pressured, never pushed — took a casual little stroll through the Georgia piney woods this sunny Sunday, paused to strike the golf ball 70 times and ambled home with perhaps the easiest Masters victory of all time. Floyd, a 33-year-old one-time playboy turned solid, sober family man, won this 40th renewal of golf’s annual spring rite with a 271 total, 17 under par and matching the tournament record for 72 holes set by Jack Nicklaus in 1965. Only handsome young Ben Crenshaw — who gave a flock of giggling girls a little thrill when he hiked his britches above his knees to wade into the pond on the 16th hole — could generate any challenge at all and that was much too little, much too late.”

25 years ago (2001)

Winner: Tiger Woods

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Score: 70-66-68-68—272

Margin: 2 shots

Prize: $1,008,000.

Runner-up: David Duval

Key to the win: Woods was locked in a thriller with his two chief rivals, Duval and Phil Mickelson. They each made bogey on the par-3 16th and never caught up to Woods, who didn’t drop a shot over the last six holes. His second Masters title allowed him to hold all four majors at the same time.

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Noteworthy: Woods swept the four majors with a combined score of 65-under par and had at least a share of the lead after 13 of the 16 rounds.

AP story: “Slam or not, Tiger Woods was simply grand. With a heart-stopper at Augusta National punctuated with a birdie at the end, Woods claimed the greatest feat in modern golf Sunday by winning the Masters, giving him a clean sweep of the four professional majors in a span of 294 days. Woods closed with a 68, steady down the haunting back nine of Augusta National as David Duval and Phil Mickelson failed to harness the magic that has carried Woods to five of the last six majors. The only thing left to debate is what to call this remarkable feat. Purists argue that a Grand Slam is accomplished in a calendar year. Woods, emotionally drained after a relentless battle from start to finish, stayed out of the argument. “I won four,” he said.”

20 years ago (2006)

Winner: Phil Mickelson

Score: 70-72-70-69—281

Margin: 2 shots

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Prize: $1,260,000

Runner-up: Tim Clark

Key to the win: Mickelson had a one-shot lead and didn’t make a bogey until the final hole. Fred Couples had a 4-foot birdie putt on the 14th to pull within one shot and three-putted.

Noteworthy: After going more than a decade before winning a major, Mickelson won three of the last nine.

AP story: “Phil Mickelson is a Masters champion again, and now he’s making it look easy. Once known as a lovable loser who needed a dozen years to figure out how to win golf’s biggest events, Mickelson captured his second straight major Sunday at Augusta National, and this one was hardly a nail-biter. He closed with a 3-under 69 for a two-shot victory over Tim Clark, and his second green jacket in three years. There were no thrills for Phil, rather calculated shots that forced Fred Couples, Tiger Woods and Vijay Singh to try to catch him. Instead, they stumbled along with three-putts and a litany of other mistakes that allowed Mickelson to stroll up the 18th fairway already knowing how this major would end.”

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10 years ago (2016)

Winner: Danny Willett

Score:70-74-72-67—283

Margin: 3 shots

Prize: $1,800,000

Runner-up: Jordan Spieth and Lee Westwood

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Key to the win: Willett was five shots behind on the back nine when Spieth made bogeys at Nos. 10 and 11 and twice hit into Rae’s Creek to make a quadruple-bogey 7 on the par-3 12th. Willett shot 33 on the back with birdies on the 13th, 14th and 16th holes.

Noteworthy: Willett became the first Englishman to win the Masters since Nick Faldo in 1996. Willett played the final round with Westwood, who also would play the final round with the U.S. Open champion (Dustin Johnson) two months later.

AP story: “Jordan Spieth couldn’t bear to watch, turning his head before another shot splashed into Rae’s Creek. Moments later, Danny Willett looked up at the large leaderboard at the 15th green and couldn’t believe what he saw. This Masters turned into a shocker Sunday, right down to the green jacket ceremony. Spieth was in Butler Cabin, just like everyone expected when he took a five-shot lead to the back nine at Augusta National. Only he was there to present it to Willett, who seized on Spieth’s collapse with a magnificent round that made him a Masters champion.”

5 years ago (2021)

Winner: Hideki Matsuyama

Score: 69-71-65-73—278

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Margin: 1 shot

Prize: $2,070,000

Runner-up: Will Zalatoris

Key to the win: Matsuyama might have won this Saturday with a bogey-free 65 to build a four-shot lead. He led by as many as six shots but effectively sealed it when Xander Schauffele hit into the water on the 16th and made triple bogey. Matsuyama bogeyed three of the last four holes.

Noteworthy: The victory came 10 years after Matsuyama made his debut at Augusta National as the Asia-Pacific Amateur champion. Matsuyama was the first Masters champion since Trevor Immelman in 2008 to be over par in the last round.

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AP story: “Hideki Matsuyama delivered golf-mad Japan the grandest and greenest prize of all. Ten years after Matsuyama made a sterling debut as the best amateur at Augusta National, he claimed the ultimate trophy Sunday with a victory in the Masters to become the first Japanese winner of the green jacket. Matsuyama closed with a 1-over 73 and a one-shot victory that was only close at the end, and never seriously in doubt after Xander Schauffele’s late charge ended with a triple bogey on the par-3 16th. Moments before Dustin Johnson helped him into the green jacket, Matsuyama needed no interpreter in Butler Cabin when he said in English, ‘I’m really happy.’”



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Augusta, GA

Federal rental aid audit prompts Augusta to bring in outside investigators

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Federal rental aid audit prompts Augusta to bring in outside investigators


AUGUSTA, Ga. (WRDW/WAGT) – Auditors say they can’t fully verify how millions in federal pandemic dollars sent to Augusta were spent.

City leaders have approved an Office of Inspector General investigation into the Housing and Community Development Department.

Augusta’s housing department received about $26 million in emergency rental assistance funds during the pandemic.

Auditors verified roughly $13.3 million was spent properly, most of it through payments to United Way. About $6.2 million was returned to the federal government because it went unused.

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But auditors could not confirm how $6.8 million was used.

Audit reveals mismanagement

Auditors said money was mixed with other accounts, transactions were recorded inconsistently, and there was not a clear paper trail to track where specific dollars went.

Auditors said that made it difficult to know how the money was spent.

Emails obtained show City Administrator Tameka Allen asked auditors whether this was mismanagement and whether federal money was used for other expenses.

Auditors responded their findings pointed to mismanagement but said determining criminal wrongdoing was outside their role.

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“It kind of felt like a hit in the stomach because our goal is to find out what is truly happening,” Allen said. “And unfortunately, they could not even provide us that information based on their expertise in the auditing field. So it goes to show that there’s a lot for us to do, a lot of things for us to correct.”

City leaders approved two outside groups to help them get back on track with their finances. Commissioners approved $32,500 a month for CKH Consulting Services to help with the finance department and $8,750 a month for BluLynx Solutions to help with Housing and Community Development.

Commissioners also voted to bring in the Office of Inspector General to look into the Housing and Community Development Department.

“The thing that I would like to stress to the community is that the governing body is being proactive and trying to make sure they do everything within the legal realms to come up with a solution as to what is actually going on in our Housing Community Development and what is necessary to actually earn the trust back from our constituents,” Allen said.

Copyright 2026 WRDW/WAGT. All rights reserved.

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We the People: Augusta trailblazer Carrie J. Mays made history as first woman on city council

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We the People: Augusta trailblazer Carrie J. Mays made history as first woman on city council


AUGUSTA, Ga. (WRDW/WAGT) – Carrie J. Mays was a trailblazer for Black women across the South.

Born in 1928, Mays became the first woman ever elected to the Augusta City Council in 1970, just a couple years after the Civil Rights Movement. She was also the first Black woman elected to city council in the Southeast.

“She was a trailblazer,” said John Hayes, associate professor of history at Augusta University.

Breaking race and gender barriers

Mays broke both a race and gender barrier by getting elected. She defeated both a white businessman and a prominent Black minister in her race for city council.

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Hayes said one of her biggest accomplishments was her role in creating a human relations commission.

The commission got legitimate funding and subpoena power. It opened new economic doors in terms of job opportunities and promotions for Augusta’s Black citizens, Hayes said.

Role in 1970 riot

Right before being elected to city council, Mays also played a role in the 1970 riot.

As a mortician, she sounded the alarm, disputing what authorities said happened to Charles Oatman.

“She’s in the crowd there and is demanding basically truth and justice holding white authorities to account,” Hayes said.

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Lasting legacy

Mays went on to become secretary of the Georgia Democratic Party and a presidential elector.

Her legacy still lives on through the Carrie J. Mays Community Center, continuing to impact Augusta more than 30 years after her passing.

“She was a great person for Augusta, for Georgia, and for the United States,” Hayes said.

The Mays family can be found all over Augusta. Willie Mays the Third was the first Black mayor of the consolidated Augusta-Richmond County. Mays Mortuary has stood for about a century.

Mays Mortuary is one of just a few buildings left in what was the Black business district during the era of segregation.

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Copyright 2026 WRDW/WAGT. All rights reserved.



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Early voting underway in Augusta, as voters are advised to do their homework

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Early voting underway in Augusta, as voters are advised to do their homework


AUGUSTA, Ga. (WJBF) – Augusta early voters are finding out that doing your homework goes along way.

“Well, my wife printed out the ballot for me, so I knew who I was going to vote for,” said Berley Green.

Whether Augusta voters select a Democrat primary ballot, Republican, or non-partisan, there are a lot of choices to make.

There is the mayor’s race, five commission races and two sales tax questions.

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“This is probably the longest ballot we’re had in Richmond County in the 30 years that I’ve been here. I’ve never seen a ballot quite this long with so many candidates,” said Travis Doss, Elections Director

Doss recommends voters get a sample ballot and study it before heading to the polls. It paid off for some early voters.

“It was a huge ballot, but if you prepare ahead of time and kind of print your ballot out and go over it kind of vet the candidates beforehand, it kind of goes smooth,” said Nicole Floyd

Augusta voters are familiar with the SPLOST question on the ballot, but they may need to go read up on the half-penny FLOST tax for property tax relief.

“No, we’ve never had that before. That was due to a law change a couple of years ago that allowed counties to opt in or opt out as far as giving tax relief,” said Doss.

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So, voters have a decision about Augusta having another sales tax.

“Do your homework on that, because it’s going to affect your pocketbook,” said Floyd.

“Enough taxes, enough taxes,” said Green.

“You’re not a supporter?”

No,” said Green.

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Early voting continues until May 15th, so there is time to get up to speed on this sizable ballot.



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