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L and invited the driver to their suite. The driver complained that he couldn't leave the horse. This left only one solution: Take the horse with them. Let's just say this wasn't a Delta Force mission. M A D E F O R P I C TU R E S Life went on its merry way for Wright. He was working for everyone, it seemed. He'd appeared in the movie Tin Cup and still receives residuals today for every time it's shown on TV. In 1996, he became the highest paid single-sport announcer on CBS. Ironically, that was the beginning of the end. It was early in the week of the 1995 LPGA Championship, sponsored by McDonald's and played at the DuPont Country Club in Delaware. The News Journal, the largest paper in the state, was no different than any other. It's all hands on deck for a national event. Even though television critic Valerie Helmbreck didn't know a sand wedge from a sandwich and admitted it, she went for a story about which she had no previous knowledge. She wanted to condemn CBS and all TV for not televising more ladies' golf events. The frst broadcaster to show up for work that day was Wright. Understanding her plight, Wright offered to give her some off-the-record background information. He candidly told her that because of the preconceived belief by corporate entities about lesbianism on the LPGA Tour, there was a reluctance of potential sponsors to come aboard and pay for the telecasts. Wright was well aware of the corporate problems because he ran a charity pro-am at his course, Kenmure in outside Flat Rock, North Carolina. Unfortunately, Helmbreck published the comments made by Wright and the story gained quick attention. As a result of comments made in the interview, CBS fred Wright. Yet, according to Wright, the head of CBS was so upset that he not only honored Wright's new contract, but has maintained his pension as well. In retrospect, the incident may have been benefcial. "I'd never thought about being burned out," Wright says. "Then there was the crunch and I was no more. It all may have been a blessing and kept me from being burned out. "I was bitter, but that's long gone now," Wright says. "A lot of people hurt me, and I found out who my friends are. There was no question that I really started to hit the bottle hard." His drinking hit the point where one morning, he awoke to fnd his dearest friends, many from the CBS crew, sitting in his living room. It was an intervention. "The Betty Ford Center had sent a guy to accompany me back to California," Wright recalls. "He sat in coach and I was in frst class. By the time we got to L.A., I was smashed and angry. When we got off the plane, I got away from this guy and got to a place where I could watch him look for me. Finally, I jumped out from behind a pole to surprise him. 'I said, 'Hee hee, I just bought a one-way ticket to Jakarta.' Then I gave up. I was still drunk when I checked in." Wright tried to make the best of the situation. "I didn't fght it," he says. "I became an admirable student and became what they call a 'granny.' I kept watch over my section. One night on my watch, a guy got out. They found him and he was dead in a gutter in Rancho Mirage. It had been visiting day, and his wife and daughter told him they never wanted anything to do with him again. He couldn't take it. "Later during my time there, a counselor called me aside and told me he didn't think I was an alcoholic," Wright says. "He thought I was more of an abuser and I thought he was right. He said that I'd do that when I was drinking with friends and that I shouldn't drink vodka again because it was dangerous. I agreed. I might have a glass of wine with dinner, but that's it." Today, his prime interests include charity golf tournaments to which he not just lends his name but his knowledge and experience as well. "I've been connected with an event in Spartanburg, South Carolina, for Mobile Wheels," he says. "Over the past seventeen years, we've raised eight million dollars. I'm also involved with a tournament at Crystal Mountain in Michigan. It supports junior golf in the area. I played in the frst one and won it, and they asked if they could name the tournament after me. I still go up there every year and entertain at their dinner." Ben Wright has known life as few have. He can call royalty and presidents "friend." He has traveled the world in frst class, and he's mingled with the rich and famous, but underneath it all there is regret. "I wish I'd had a normal childhood," he says. "I think I missed quite a lot. Always listening for planes and rockets and spending most of your life in an airraid shelter isn't the way a child should grow up." While you can never buy back time, Wright was able to spread a child-like existence over a lifetime and live it through the eyes and body of an adult. It may not have worked out as he may have wished. But it certainly worked out, and it hasn't been boring. Summer 2013 . Tempus-Magazine.com 41