[Charlie Goerges]

Lots of old, out-of-print and out of copyright books are available for free online through sites like google books, openlibrary.org, and the Gutenberg project. I’ve come across many and thought I’d post a few images from the books I’ve found.

No rhyme or reason to the choices I made, just images that caught my fancy.


The first four images come from Bernard Darwin’s Golf Courses of the British Isles. All of the paintings are done by Harry Rountree.

Ganton:



Sandy Lodge:



Royal Troon:



Westward Ho!




The next one comes from a book called The Book of the Links.

Soup Bowl at Rye:



The next bunch come from A. Mackenzie’s book Golf Architecture.

Harrogate 17:




Headingly 2:



Headingly 16:



Moortown 8 (Gibralter):



Moortown 8 (Gibralter green sketch):



Sitwell Park #?:





Sorry I don’t have time to expound a great deal, but maybe this will help someone find what they are looking for.

[Garland Bayley]

Charlie,

I nominate you for site MVP.

[Peter Ferlicca]

Wow, the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th pictures are mesmerizing.  If I could have all three of those pictures hanging up in nice frames, oooooooowwwwweeeee, I would be a happy man.

[Charlie Goerges]

Charlie,

I nominate you for site MVP.

Garland, I would feel a bit like Obama with the Nobel; I don't deserve it!

[Nick Church]

I would have enjoyed the opportunity to putt around on that green at Sitwell park.  Some late summer day when I'm the last on the course, and could repeatedly drop balls, trying different angles and slopes.

[Terry Lavin]

I would have enjoyed the opportunity to putt around on that green at Sitwell park.  Some late summer day when I'm the last on the course, and could repeatedly drop balls, trying different angles and slopes.

Fun idea.  It reminds me of a putt I had on the Short hole at Old Macdonald.  I was about twelve feet right of the hole location and I putted the ball fifteen feet on the high side, endeavoring to find a funnel that would feed the ball back left at a proper speed to cozy up to the hole.  It wound up a few feet past the hole, but after I made par (whew), I tried a more direct approach and got it within eight feet, but could get no closer without taking a lot of speed out of the ball by hitting it up and to the right.  It's not a precise science, but it sure is fun.

[Ed Oden]

I'm bumping this thread for two reasons.  First, Charlie's original post had some great pics.  And second, I've found a number of classic books which can be read/downloaded for free at http://openlibrary.org/ including, among others:

Some Essays on Golf Course Architecture - Colt (1920)  http://www.archive.org/stream/cu31924020604223#page/n9/mode/2up

The Life of Tom Morris - Tullock (1907)  http://www.archive.org/stream/lifeoftommorrisw00tulliala#page/n9/mode/2up

Golf Greens and Greenkeeping - Hutchinson (1906)  http://www.archive.org/stream/golfgreensgreenk00hutcrich#page/n9/mode/2up

Golf Courses of the British Isles -  Darwin (1910)  http://www.archive.org/stream/golfcoursesofbri00darwuoft#page/n9/mode/2up

Just thought I'd pass it along for those not aware of this site.

[Andy Stamm]

The USGA's Seagle Electronic Golf Library has some good ones as well.

http://www.usgamuseum.com/researchers/usga_segl/

I wouldn't bother with the search function (there aren't that many), I'd just browse.

They've got some periodicals

Golf (1898 - 1917)  
Golf Illustrated (1914 - 1934)  
The American Golfer (1908 - 1923)  
The Golfer (1895 - 1903)

As well as monographs and most of the rules books.

[Josh Smith]

Roundtree was a master with his watercolors, I also learned he illustrated a few childrens books.  Fantastic Style.

Thanks for sharing this.

[Bruce Hardie]

Horace Hutchinson's 50 YEARS OF GOLF was available for Amazon Kindle at $0.00

[Ed Oden]

Another great resource for free downloads of out of print books and periodicals is the HathiTrust Digital Library... http://m.catalog.hathitrust.org/

For example, they have a digital copy of Golf Architecture in America by George C. Thomas, which can be a pricy acquisition for a hard copy... http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?skin=mobile;id=mdp.39015007183372;#page/viii/mode/2up

[Garland Bayley]

Great! Now my wife is going to be on my case even more about computer time over face time.
 

[Michael Whitaker]

The painting of Westward Ho is amazing...

It is an amazing painting, Brian... but, I don't remember that scene or anything that dramatic when I played Westward Ho! with Wardo. Was I blinded by his trousers?

[Tags:]

Tags:

[Tags:]

Tags:

Call to undefined function theme_linktree()