‘What? WHAT?’ Memorabilia section of 1996 GMO dash at Brown Deer Park – Tiger Week – sells for $69,000 at auction | Gary D’Amato

Scott Mohr was beyond exhausted when he left the Brown Deer Park golf course on the evening of September 1, 1996.

It’s been a huge week for the Greater Milwaukee Open. Tiger Woods had made his professional debut in the now-defunct PGA Tour event, which meant bigger than usual galleries, more security, more personnel on the ropes and bigger headaches for Mohr, the president of the marshal.

However, as he passed the clubhouse, Mohr noticed that the huge scoreboard was still in place, on which the scores and hole-by-hole totals for each player had been painstakingly recorded by a calligrapher and stapled to plywood.

On a whim, he stopped his car, removed the section with Woods’ name on it, rolled it up, and threw it in the backseat. It would make a nice souvenir, he thought.

Little did he know he had just grabbed what would one day be a much-loved collector’s item.

On Sunday, the 24-by-40-inch thick paper section that for 25 years was nailed to the ceiling in Mohr’s rec room sold for $69,000 at an auction conducted by Dallas-based Heritage Auctions .

Mohr, who lives in Menomonee Falls, said in his wildest dreams he could not have imagined it would be worth so much.

“Oh, hell no,” he said. “I had it on display in the basement in the playroom. There were a few golf-related people I’ve taken there over the years who said, “Take a load of it.” They would look at him and say, “That’s cool,” and then we’d go back upstairs.

The scoreboard section contains hole-by-hole scores from Woods’ third and fourth rounds, including the hole-in-one he landed on the No. 14 in the final round. He shot 73-68 on the weekend and finished tied for 60th.

Because the scoreboard was done in alphabetical order, the section also includes weekend scores from David Toms, Bobby Wadkins, Duffy Waldorf, Willie Wood and Richard Zokol.

Mohr, 66, had no idea he had something of great value to golf collectors until he read an article in the Green Bay Press-Gazette in 2021 about a full ticket from the 1996 GMO which sold for $37,200 in a catalog auction conducted by Heritage Auctions.

Mohr emailed Heritage with a photo and description of his one-of-a-kind Woods piece and quickly heard from Chris Nerat, a consignment manager who lives in Green Bay and is one of the most well-known experts in vintage Packers memorabilia material.

“He said, ‘Oh yeah, we’re very interested,'” Mohr said. “So shortly after that I drove to Sheboygan and he drove from Green Bay because it was halfway there. I had this thing spread out on the dash and he filmed me in m explaining what it was and why I had it.

In June, Mohr signed a consignment agreement with Heritage, which estimated the dashboard section to be worth $60,000.

“I had lunch with the guy who does our taxes a month and a half ago and said, ‘There might be a taxable event,'” Mohr said. “He said, ‘Oh, what is this?’ I explained to him. I said, “I have no idea what it will be. And I really didn’t know. Your imagination is running wild. Is this going to change money’s life? Probably. not.

When the auction closed at 10 p.m. on Sunday, Mohr saw the highest bid was $16,500. He went to bed slightly disappointed. “I was like, ‘Well, it’s not as much as I was hoping for,'” he said. “But it’s never as much as you hope, is it?”

Mohr knew next to nothing about how auctions worked, so he didn’t know about extended auctions – a dynamic feature that allows auctions to automatically extend an ad’s closing time based on auction activity in a period. determined. A flurry of activity in extended bidding pushed the price up to $69,000, less Heritage’s commission.

“When I went to the website (the next day) morning, I called (his wife) Nancy from the other room and said, ‘You might want to watch this,'” Mohr said. “She looks at him and blinks and says, ‘What? WHAT?’

“I am a rookie in this field. Whatever they do, I’m obviously glad it’s four times bigger than I thought.

At the same Heritage auction on Sunday, a 1952 Topps Mickey Mantle baseball card sold for $12.6 million, a record for a sporting item.

Mohr said he would receive his check from Heritage in about 30 days.

“I suspect there will also be a 1099 in there,” he said.