Moments in History: Every so often, a U.S. Open becomes the backdrop for a defining moment in golf.

From the inception of the championship in 1895, its competitors have understood the importance and value of the U.S. Open to their careers. The United States Golf Association, keeper of the game and its national events, has nurtured that grand sense of significance and tradition.

Yet it is the finest players of the game who have molded the stature of the Open.

We have selected eight U.S. Opens deigned the best ever played. We could have picked eight more and not created an argument. While some U.S. Opens are dreary pedestrian events, many bear the excitement expected of a national championship.

Not coincidentally, these eight were won by past and present stars of golf, most often representing milestones.

What: 1913 U.S. Open

When: Sept. 18-20

Where: The Country Club, Brook-line, Massachusetts

Francis Ouimet was matter-of-fact about his situation. He had used the remaining vacation from his job at a sporting goods store to play in the 1913 U.S. Amateur at the Garden City Golf Club near New York City.

Ouimet had qualified well at the Amateur, his 151 score for 36 holes only three behind Chick Evans. Ouimet won his first-round match but, through the luck of the draw, faced defending champion Jerome Travers in the second round. Travers prevailed, 3 and 2, in their match and went on to defend his title successfully.

A number of factors led Ouimet to enter the U.S. Open.

The championship was to be played nearly across the street from the home where he grew up. As a youth, Ouimet and his older brother Wilfred collected stray golf balls on the layout on their way to school. Wilfred, who caddied at The Country Club, brought home a golf club one day. He and Ouimet took it to a pastureland behind their house and created a three-hole golf course.

Ouimet turned from golf ball collector to user. He was hooked and built a reputation as a good young player. During his school years, Ouimet also caddied at The Country Club to learn more about the game, all the while gaining local knowledge about the course.

He won a high school title and three Massachusetts Amateur crowns before age 20. That was local golf. Now the U.S. Open, with the best professionals of the time, was coming to his town.

An American groundswell of interest in golf had begun during this decade. Johnny McDermott had won the U.S. Open in 1911 and successfully defended that title in 1912. He was the first native-born Open champion. Only now did American-born players feel competent to play with the British-born champions.

When McDermott won his first title, only 72 players entered the championship. This year, 162 entries were filed with the United States Golf Association.

And the best of Britain had returned to America. Harry Vardon, clearly the best player of the era, and his friend Ted Ray, the 1912 British Open champion, played a series of exhibition matches in the U.S. prior to the U.S. Open (courtesy of a manufacturing company they represented) and had not lost a single match.

Vardon had won the U.S. Open in his only previous attempt, in 1900.

The American contingent of sometimes raucous players and always steadfast officials were anxious to "show their best" to the Brits. Because of Ouimet’s local titles, the USGA asked him to play in the Open.

And certainly, Ouimet had a curiosity about Vardon and Ray. He wanted to see just how good world champions were.

Ouimet entered but knew he could not compete.

Days before the championship, Ouimet’s boss, John Morrill, saw Ouimet’s name among the championship pairings in the local newspaper. Morrill inquired, and Ouimet explained the situation.

"As long as you have entered, you had better plan to play," Morrill said. He had no idea how important that decision would become.

The championship was set over two days, two rounds to be played in each.

After the morning first round, a pair of British-born American professionals, MacDonald Smith and Alex Ross, led with 71s, three under par. Vardon and Ray were off their games with 75 and 79. Ouimet shot 77.

Vardon came to the front with an afternoon 72, his 147 total tied with Wilfred Reid of England. Ray rebounded with 70 to spend the night two behind his traveling companion. Ouimet shot an afternoon 74 for 151, four shots back.

Politics came into play that evening as Reid and Ray began a lively discussion at supper about taxation in the U.S. and in England. A fistfight ensued, and the much larger Ray left Reid with a bloody nose.

A shaken Reid fell quickly from contention the next morning and shot 85-86, sharing 16th place.

Vardon and Ray started play early the second day in a constant, miserable drizzle. Vardon shot 78, Ray 76, bringing the rest of the field into the hunt. Ouimet shot 74 and was tied with the best players of the world at 225 with one round to go.

Perhaps it was the worsening weather, maybe the fact that Vardon and Ray had tired from their packed schedule (they were 43 and 36 years old, respectively), or maybe it was the fact that they perceived this as a duel between the two of them, showing little concern for the unknown amateur. Neither Vardon nor Ray played well the second afternoon.

Again playing later than the British pair, Ouimet had the advantage of knowing how Vardon and Ray were playing. Vardon shot 42 and Ray 43 on the front nine.

Ouimet was unnerved himself, shooting 43 on the front nine to trail Vardon by one. The Brits recovered for a pair of 79s but told reporters they knew they had lost the title. There were too many good players left on the golf course for 304 to win.

What they underestimated, however, was how the weather took its toll on nearly everyone else. Ouimet learned that he had to play the last four holes one under par to tie Vardon and Ray. Once again daunted by his position, Ouimet was shaky. He had to hole a chip shot at the 15th and a nine-foot putt at the 16th for pars. He hit his 12-foot birdie putt at the 17th a little too hard, but his ball hit the back of the hole and dropped for the required birdie. He parred the last hole and was tied with the British legends once again.

The U.S. Open was to be determined, now, by an 18-hole playoff the next day. Once again, the Brits felt this was a battle simply between the two of them. After all, they had won six British Opens and one U.S. Open.

McDermott, the 1912 champion, encouraged Ouimet before the start. "Play your own game, Francis, and forget them."

This might have been easier were there not a gallery of 5,000, obvious in their support for Ouimet, who showed despite another day of drizzle.

All three players shot 38 on the front nine.

Ray and Vardon bogeyed the par-three 10th, and Ouimet birdied the par-five 12th to take a two-shot lead.

Ray, who had played poorly the previous afternoon and who felt a larger need to keep his reputation intact, was the first to break and began to take risky shots. He shot 40 on the back nine for 78.

Vardon gained one shot back on Ouimet with a birdie at the 13th.

The par-four 17th was crucial. Ouimet hit his approach shot 15 feet from the hole and made birdie three. Vardon bunkered his approach shot and took bogey five. Ouimet had a three-shot lead and, barring a tragedy on the home hole, the U.S. Open title.

It was Vardon who broke at the 18th hole, however, taking a double-bogey six for 77.

Ouimet shot 72 to beat not only the most revered players of the day, head to head, but to become the first amateur to win the Open and only the second native-born American to do so. The fact that he was a hometown boy only flavored the triumph. He was an instant hero for the middle-class masses, a giant beater.

Throughout the three-day ordeal, Ouimet used 10-year-old Eddie Lowery, who did not quite stand as tall as Ouimet’s driving club, as his caddie. Ouimet’s favorite caddie dumped him at the beginning of the week for a more famous player.

Frank Hoyt, one of Ouimet’s friends, asked Ouimet if he could caddie for him in the playoff. Ouimet said that would be fine, but only if Lowery agreed and was paid for the round.

Lowery, crying at the thought of abandoning Ouimet, declined Hoyt’s offer.

The black-and-white photograph of Ouimet and Lowery trudging through the muck has become an icon of this Open championship story.

Ouimet did not again win the Open, although amateurs Evans and Travers would do so by 1916.

Ouimet tied for fifth in the next Open but won the U.S. Amateur in 1914, beating two-time winner Travers in the final match. Well past his prime, Ouimet won the U.S. Amateur again in 1931.

Despite the fame his Open triumph brought him, Ouimet remained as unassuming and modest as he was as a fresh-faced 20-year-old.

Ouimet’s triumph signaled a number of things. Golf grew quickly in popularity. Americans never again feared Brits; we were equals. Amateurs were as competitive in the national championship as the professionals and would be for another two decades.

And, just maybe, anyone can win the Open.