Golf in America circa 1903?

[Melvyn Morrow]

I have in the passed be criticized for my comments regards the different game played across the pond. Interestingly the following article from The Scotsman dated the 1st of December 1903 shows how quickly the game in North America has indeed been changed from the original ideas exported to America.

I will leave you to make up your own minds, but I can understand what Mr J.A.T. Bramston is saying. But can you?


Continues/..

[Bill_McBride]

No argument at all, Melvyn.  Dr Mackenzie lamented the "scorecard and pencil" mentality, and it is very true.  Most of the guys I play with even want to know your score if you just finished a fourball match play round.  What relevance does the number of strokes taken have when you should pick up when you're out of a hole and your partner has carried on?

I know that Charles Blair Macdonald had serious disagreements with early USGA policies that he felt didn't reflect the ideals of golf he felt were exemplified and required by the R&A in St Andrews where he learned to play.  It's a pretty fascinating history.

Every American golfer should take a trip to Scotland to see how much fun links golf and golf in general can be.

Pretty good single malt whisky too. 

[Kalen Braley]

Melyvn,

Interesting article and he's entitled to his opinion.

I just don't see why a sport can't be different things to different people.

Take walking for example.  Some people like to just take a leisurly walk around the block..thats just fine.  Others like to go for a long walk for more health benefits...ok not a problem. And some even like to go hardcore and make it a sport thats even included in the Olympics...fine with that too.

I can think of many sports where this is also the case.  So why can't this be the same in golf?  In the UK its a relaxation thing, no problem with that.  In the US its more pencil and card mindset, fine there too.  I would never insist anyone play by either style, they just do whatever they prefer.  So I honestly don't see why it "should be" or "proper" to do it one way, and one way only.

P.S.  As for the Brits not being competitive.  They did create the first championship of golf did they not?  And it was Stroke play where they kept track of scores in pencil and card fashion right?    

[Melvyn Morrow]

Bill

Wise as usual and very knowledgeable about our game. Expected nothing else from you. I love links golf and the way you have to play the course in all conditions, as you stated golfers should try our courses. I am looking forward to reading your report on Askernish went you get round to playing it.

Kalen

Play the game you want, I don’t have a problem as I have mention previously. That article is interesting because golf had just been introduced to America and changes were already seeping through. I feel it explains the difference fairly well, but that is not disrespecting your game, its just stating an opinion.

 ‘As for the Brits not being competitive’ don’t kid yourself, we are, but only when it really matters. I like to win, who doesn’t, but the taking part and showing you can loose gracefully is just as important. But put our backs to the wall and boy you better watch out. If my memory serves me correctly we may have lost a war a thousand miles from our home but our Capitol was never burnt down.       Glad we are friends now.

[David_Tepper]

Melvyn -

That is a very interesting article. Thanks for posting it.

It certainly did not take long for America to stamp its own persona on the game of golf.

DT

[Melvyn Morrow]

David

Yes, I thought it interesting as it showed a slight difference in our games some 105 years ago. Not having played in North America it has explained a few things for me. There is certainly a difference in our general approach but then that could be due to many things i.e. environment etc.

I have never found the need to excel in golf just enjoy the game because that was the way I was taught, but when it came to track, field or swimming events, I was my school champ at these sports. But then by their nature they are competitive, where as golf can be described as a walk in the park (my case, the beach).

Still surprised how quickly things seem to change.

[Bill_McBride]

"Still surprised how quickly things seem to change. "

I assume you refer to how the attitude toward golf in the UK changed when it was taken up in America.

I think there were some good reasons for that.  For one, I don't think a lot of Americans around the turn of the 20th Century would have gone to Scotland or England to experience golf as it was played over there, so a sui generis version undoubtedly developed in the U.S.

For another, the Scottish and English golf professionals who came to America were most likely treated as tradesmen rather than equals, and they most likely let the American wealthy businessmen who took up the game learn the manners and spirit on their own.

America at that time was also growing as an industrial power based on technological advances.  I suspect there was a lot of attention paid by wealthy American industrialists and financiers, those most likely to be playing the new game, to statistical results and accuracy, and that would account for the emphasis on the actual score reported at the end of a round.

There are fascinating photos of Andrew Carnegie and John D. Rockefeller learning to play golf.  Don't you imagine those guys wanted to be able to measure exactly how they were doing against their competitors and how their skills were growing?

It was a fascinating era.

[David_Tepper]

Bill -

I doubt the golf professionals in GB&I were treated as equals either at the turn of the 20th century, at least among the upper-crust golf clubs there. As I recall, golf professionals were not allowed to access the clubhouse at least at one club hosting the British Open in the 1920's. There is a famous story about Walter Hagen having lunch in his rented Rolls Royce during an Open championship because the professionals competing were not allowed in the clubhouse.

DT

[Bill_McBride]

David, very true.   I suspect there were some good relationships -
Bobby Jones and Stewart Maiden being a good example - but never social equality until well into the mid-20th Century.

[Kirk Gill]

I find the comments in the article regarding the practice swing to be of great interest.

For Mr. Morrow and those players in the UK - has the practice swing overtaken the game there the way it has here? I know some TERRIBLE golfers who take up to four swipes at the "imaginary ball" (love that terminology!) before every swing. It's a personal pet peeve of mine, slowing down the round, and having no appreciable positive effect on the result of the ensuing "actual" swing. The guy who taught me the most about the game always took a half-swipe as he approached the ball, just to "see where the ground is" as he'd say.

Watching some of the professionals with their incessant practice swings drives me NUTS.

I'd never thought of it as an american phenomenon before, though. I guess an american wouldn't !

[Bradley Anderson]

Hmmm - I don't know - they didn't seem too very cheery when they handed Walter Travis the British Open Cup did they.

[Bill_McBride]

Hmmm - I don't know - they didn't seem too very cheery when they handed Walter Travis the British Open Cup did they.

But they did try to outlaw his putter! 

[Phil_the_Author]

Melvyn,

How about a response to all articles of this nature written on your side of the pond at that time by someone from the same time period... A.W. Tillinghast. This is from, Tillinghast: Creator of Golf Courses:

"With the explosive growth and popularity of golf becoming combined with the American attitudes and belief in the superiority of its culture and way of life, it was not surprising that the British golf writers, as a whole, had begun to take a dim view toward the newcomers to the game on the
other side of the pond. So, in defense of the American game and the courses on which it is played, Tillinghast, chastising those who wrote of and played the game in Britain, stated, “In most of the journals which are devoted to golf, we constantly find the most absurd references to the game and its play in this country. Our golf is altogether freakish and our players mad fanatics. When Mr. Henry Leach visited us last summer he returned
to England praising our courses, our golf and our men. His references to American golf in the British periodicals are as an oasis in the desert. We can only deplore the fact that other writers have not visited our country, that they might know whereof they speak…

"Golf in America is a dignified, firmly established institution, and we are big enough to ignore many thoughtless, but nevertheless unkind, thrusts. No doubt they are intended to be humorous, and if they chance to amuse the British readers as much as they amuse us, although in different vein, they may be classed with such popular successes as ‘Wot Ho! She Bumps!’…

"Joking aside, gentlemen, it does get under the skin a bit when you devote your space to an almost reverent analysis of the game of Daudi Chwa, the black monarch of Uganda, and his course at Kampala, and on the same page flippantly refer to ‘Goat Golf ’ as the popular form of game in America. We are rather inclined to regard golf as a game for gentlemen throughout the world, and far too great a game to be restricted by the bounds of nations. If Daudi Chwa plays golf, it proves that he is a good sort; but why discriminate because we happen to have white skins?”

There really was as great deal of criticism leveled toward both sides from the other at this time about play, ability and talent, character and excellence of courses and much more.

Before you give too much deserved credence to what Mr. Bramston concludes, consider that there is a very strong and opposite view held by others on both sides of the water in those days...
 

[Melvyn Morrow]

Philip

I like it, at least two sides to every opinion. I would venture the following response. 

Rather a long excuse for taking a sport kindly passed on, trying to reinvent it, then seeking the credit for the compromise, which is in part a shadow of its former self. Then deciding that it was not just a walking sport, so another modification is required in the form of carts, followed by the unacceptable and ugly carts tracks. Realising that more frustration can be added to the poor golfer, the invention of the practice swing is thrown in for good measure. Still not satisfied that you have stamped your mark on the game, up comes the Daddy of them all ‘No Walking’ Courses.

I am proud of our original game and am more than happy for you guys to come over and play our courses and experience the game of golf. As for your game, that is indeed your choice and you have every right to play it the way you want – I am just waiting to hear the name of your – lets call it what it is – your modified game.

I am not claiming the high moral ground, just trying to be honest, but what does concern me is that part of your game is creeping in here and corrupting our game. That part I am not that keen on, but we are all free to voice our opinions and play the game as we see fit. I just want to play the way my family has always played golf, to stick to what I believe are the core values of the game, I just do not see the need to change for the sake of change, laziness or for any other reason – do you guys have a problem with that, because I have the right to my opinion and my choice - if you do, you should be living under the USSR.

But then in real terms it is just a sport, I have no claim on it and so not worth getting hot under the collar – but it does add to an interesting debate – now is that a UK or USA debate, perhaps we better not go there.

Still an interesting article and I am genuinely surprised at how quickly the sport started to change when it was taken up on mass across the pond. 

[Steve Lang]

   By men and women.. Olympians




Was/is this just not a class thing in the UK?  versus liberty in the USA to compete from any background, in any sector, to endeavor and either succed or fail, win or lose.. where score is what counts, not appeasement..

Journal of Sport History, Vol. 21, No. 2 (Summer 1994)
From Pitch to Putt:
Sport and Class
in Anglo-American Sport
Steven A. Riess
Department of History
Northeastern Illinois University

Class has always been one of the paramount issues in sport historiography.
During the period 1983-1992, historians have continued to debate the role of
class in sport history, particularly its relationship to modernization, industrialization,
and urbanization. Scholars have focused on such concerns as agency and
hegemony, cultural diffusion, socialization, crowd composition and behavior,
and social mobility. This essay examines how scholars have dealt with class as
an independent and dependent variable in the United States, Great Britain. and
Canada, whose sport historiography is in each case firmly based on their national
scholarly traditions. Thus grand theory, particularly Marxism, and its
sophisticated variants, remains a major feature of British literature, moderately
so in Canada, and is largely avoided, if not rejected, in the United States. Class
remains the central issue in British sport historiography, while Canadians are
nearly equally concerned with other factors like colonialism, ethnicity and nationalism,
and Americans consider class not much more prominent than race and
ethnicity as a major feature of industrial capitalism and urbanization.

[Mark Chaplin]

Kalen - it maybe true about the card and pencil but I probably play a dozen rounds a year where they are needed.

David - you refer to the 1920 Open at Deal, the following year professionals were allowed into the clubhouse, no doubt influenced by Mr Hagen's stand. Interestingly visiting the Inverness Club earlier this year we were shown the beautiful clock presented to the club by the professionals in 1920 for the treatment the pros received.

It's interesting to note even in 1903 "we" thought the golf rather one dimentional.

[Melvyn Morrow]

Steve

Call it what you will, but you cannot get away from the fact the game has been modified since it was exported to your side of the world.

Clearly you are happy with the way the game is played in North America, and in truth I am not, but then I am able to play my normal game on many of our courses, which to me is what it’s all about.

Nothing to do with class, race, religion, moral high ground, a deprived childhood or any other excuse, but I will accept that my taste may well be different to others both in the UK or overseas.

I like the saying “If It's Not Broken, Don't Fix It”. That very much applies to my game of golf, but clearly that is not how it was seen over the pond.

As for access into the club house, my mother, wife and sister-in-law are not allowed into the R&A to see Old or Young Tom’s trophies and Championship Belt that my family gave to the Club after Old Tom’s death. But that’s another subject.

PS Askernish has no distance or yardage markers of any sort, a true golf course for lets say The Real Golfer - for want of a better word. 

[Bradley Anderson]

Hmmm - I don't know - they didn't seem too very cheery when they handed Walter Travis the British Open Cup did they.

But they did try to outlaw his putter! 

Exactly. Judging from how we treated their champions when they played here verses how they treated our champions when they played there, I think you could make as good a case for their being overly competitive.

I guess you could also attribute that to nationalism. But in either case, how can you critic the civility of an entire country based on the fact that their men want to win in an activity that is a game?

[Steve Lang]

  Melvyn,

If you're ever in the Houston area, please come and join us for some match play at the WCC, though we may have to work slightly at getting a foresomes match together.. (calling English Jim)..  which I guess says it all..

There are simple observations I've made which are probably as true today as 100 years ago: 

1) most golfers here want to play their own ball to get as much play out of the time alotted or available,  (how else would on get better?)

2) those secure in their game and looking for competition want to test themselves against the largest field, be it one or a dozen+.

3) most strive to make sure the competition is fair and challenging, but when wagering is in play, there will be checks if not a negotiated match basis.


p.s. as one who started playing in open spaces, shooting at trees and objects around the neighborhood school yard etc.. with my best friend, I can fully relate to your opinion.. 

[Thomas MacWood]

Bramston was a member of the O&C golf team that toured the US in 1903. I believe they went undefeated on that tour until their final match at Ekwanok, which the US won thanks to Walter Travis. Travis won the deciding match against John Low. I suspect Travis might be behind some of those complaints. He was famous for his practice regiment. Ironically Travis won the British Am in 1904, and the complaints became even louder, althought they shortly evolved into questions as to why Americans were dominating the game. The conclusion, the Americans took the game more seriously, including practicing more often. Bramston was a rising star when he wrote that article unfortunately he was stricken with some sort of illness in '03, and died in 1906 at the age of 26.