Charlotte native Charlie Sifford became the first black member of the all-white Professional Golfers Association in 1961. He was also the first African American to win on the PGA Tour with his victory at the Los Angeles Open in 1967.

Walking Quail Hollow Club for the opening round of the PGA Championship today, I couldn’t help but think of Charlie Sifford.

What would he have thought at the sight of the world’s best golfers and multitudes of people congregated in South Charlotte? He’d think it a good thing, no doubt. And perhaps he’d also be amazed how the game and his hometown have changed since he was a caddy at Carolina Golf and Country Club in the mid-1940s. Back then, Charlotte wasn’t big enough as a market for the PGA Championship, and it sure wasn’t ready to let Charlie Sifford onto a golf course as a professional.

“We didn’t have golf in school when I was there, and blacks weren’t allowed to play at the country club,” Sifford told The Post in 2011. “I started playing golf because I loved the game, and I love it because it requires you to use your brain.”

Sifford, who desegregated the whites-only Professional Golf Association in 1961, was the sport’s Jackie Robinson, paving the way for African Americans like Lee Elder Tiger Woods and Harold Varner III of Gastonia. He was the first African American to win a PGA Tour event at the 1967 Los Angeles Open and in 2004 was the first black person inducted to the World Golf Hall of Fame, affirming his impact on the sport. He died in 2015 at age 92.

“He was certainly one of the first African-Americans to break the color barrier,” Hall of Fame member relations director Brodie Waters said in that 2011 article. “He was the first to play in a PGA tour event, and he was the first African-American to be inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame. He didn’t necessarily have the amount of wins that some of the others golfers have, but you could also make the argument he didn’t have the opportunity to play as much as they did given the challenges he faced. There’s a whole group of pioneers, if you will, and Dr. Sifford is certainly at the top of that list with many golfers, including Lee Elder.”

Charlotte’s come a long way, too. In 1957, city-owned Bonnie Brae golf course, now Revolution Park Golf Course, dropped its segregation policy, a major turning point in the local drive for equality. By the 1990s, the most exclusive clubs finally got with the times and opened their memberships to well-heeled folks of economic means, regardless of color.

“He’s from my hometown, he grew up with my grandfather, Russell McLaughlin, and they played Little League baseball together,” said Andre Springs, the golf coach and athletics director at Livingstone College. “Charlie Sifford is the one who raised the standards and set the bar to let black people know you can do anything you want to do if you put your mind to it.”

In the 60 years since Bonnie Brae, much has changed. Charlotte isn’t overtly complicit in barring access to anyone because of race, gender, religion or national origin. We’re more likely to shut it off because of economics, which is a growing social crisis. But people with a dream and skill can reach the upper levels of sport, something Sifford and others like him made possible.

“I’m quite sure there are some black kids who could be out there playing, but it’s got to be up to the individual,” Sifford said in 2011. “Do you want to put forth the effort?”

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