TaylorMade also introduced different versions of the club to accommodate various golfer’s skill levels… the Burner and Tour Burner, which ultimately found its way into 147 tour pro’s bags that same year. The first Burner was introduced as a 7° driver in 1983. The nickname stuck and TaylorMade began etching it into the rest of the drivers in the line.Īnd thus, the TaylorMade Pittsburgh Persimmon driver was born in 1980. When the first metal driver came out, it was simply the ‘1 Metal’, or the “M1” if you will.īut less than a year later, Adams put out a handwritten sign reading “Pittsburgh Persimmon” referring to the driver head’s steel construction. Little did they know, these old TaylorMade drivers would change the golf industry forever! The Original “M1” and the Pittsburgh Persimmon He took out a $26,000 loan on his house, and with the help of 3 employees, created a single product: But he had an idea to create a ‘wood’ made from metal. Gary Adams, the founder of TaylorMade, was a simple golf equipment salesman in the 1970s. After all, it didn’t make much sense to call it a ‘Wood’ anymore right? Birth of the Metalwood It was only later, after the metal club heads began to catch on, that the term ‘Driver’ started to rise in popularity. That’s right, up until that historic day in 1979, all drivers had been constructed from laminated persimmon wood… hence the name ‘1 Wood’ (or the more common ‘fairway wood’ you still hear today). Did you know that TaylorMade was the very first company to make a metal driver?

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