Old copies Golf Illustrated Magazine

[Alfonso Erhardt]

I am interested in reviewing old copies of the UK version of Golf Illustrated magazine, which I have seen are available for public consultation at the British Library. I would appreciate any helpful hints prior to planning my first visit there.

I am looking for a very specific topic (golf architecture in Spain prior to 1936, and most notably, Colt and Simpson's presence over here), which narrows down my research efforts.

Is there any broad index of the topics included in each of the magazines that one can consult or must I go magazine by magazine, reviewing its content?

Are the magazines available in digital format anywhere? (I know about the american version of American Golfer and Golf Illustrated which are available at the USGA site).

Of course, any help with the above topics (both regarding the BL and info on Simpson and/or Colt in Spain) is greatly appreciated.

Regards,

[Sean_Tully]

Alfonso-

I for one love looking at the UK Golf Illustrated magazines they are a wonderful source of information and can get you interested in a wide range of courses and topics. As for me I have been lucky to go through a number of issues, but mostly from the late 1890's to about 1904. They cover a wide breadth of golf surprisingly as I found a nice article on golf in California in 1901. I have only been able to see them in an auction house so my time is rather limited with them. I have gone through a number of old magazines and you should be able to get through a number of issues as they were pretty thin, at least for the older issues. It is always a good idea to narrow the area that you plan on researching, but it will be hard as you will be looking at some information that some of us researchers would love to get our hands on. The more you search the better you will get at finding information, the words that  you are looking for just start popping out at you.

Would be interested in the early mentions of Colt and Mackenzie and if Mackenzie ever made it over to the European mainland with Colt. I will go through my things to see if I have anything to add to your search in my files.

Good luck and be careful this can be rather addictive.

Tully

[Alfonso Erhardt]

Sean,

I am already addicted, but fortunate enough to have selected a quite narrow topic for investigation. It should help minimize procrastination related to reading through old magazines, papers, letters, etc.

Regards,

[Neil_Crafter]

Alfonso
I don't think there is any alternative to getting to the British Library in London (Colindale branch has the old magazines and you should also check out "Golfing" as well as "Golf Illustrated") to go through these magazines issue by issue as nowhere are they digitally available in the way that the USGA and the LA Athletics Club have scanned US Golf Illustrated and the American Golfer.

As part of our Mackenzie research project I have arranged for a London based student who is doing the EIGCA architecture course to help us out by searching through these old magazines in the BL. It is likely to be a fairly time consuming process as we are looking for all references to Mackenzie and his courses from 1907 until his death in 1934. He will be starting on it this week and if you like, I can ask him to keep his eyes open for any references to Spain and Colt and Simpson, as he goes along.
cheers Neil

[Alfonso Erhardt]

Neil,

Thanks for your help Neil. I would really appreciate if you could please ask your student to do as you suggest. I don't think the topic will cause to much interference with his work, as references to Spain should be quite scarce (unfortunately....).

Thanks for your help again and best regards,

[RJ_Daley]

The Babcock Ag library at the University of Wisconsin had some of the early golf pubs, particularly the old US Greenkeeper mag or journal from the inception of its publication.  I used to peruse them back in the late 80s.  I don't know what is there now that I've left.  Maybe Phil McDade could take a trip to see.  I'll bet some of the old east coast University libraries have stacks with some old pubs. 

[Andrew Carr]

Bumping quite an old thread here, because after listening to the Fried Egg Podcast on The Evolution of the Old Course with Garrett Morrison and Bob Crosby, there was a mention of some cartoons in the 1905 Golf Illustrated that depicted the addition of new bunkers by John L. Lowe.  They were drawn supposedly disparaging the 1905 bunkering and I would love to find those images.  Does anyone know if there is a place where Golf Illustrated is visible digitally?

[Tom_Doak]

Bumping quite an old thread here, because after listening to the Fried Egg Podcast on The Evolution of the Old Course with Garrett Morrison and Bob Crosby, there was a mention of some cartoons in the 1905 Golf Illustrated that depicted the addition of new bunkers by John L. Lowe.  They were drawn supposedly disparaging the 1905 bunkering and I would love to find those images.  Does anyone know if there is a place where Golf Illustrated is visible digitally?

I don't believe it is available digitally.


The Cornell Agriculture School Library had bound copies of several years' worth of these, but mostly from the 1920's and early 1930's, not going back to 1905.  They are a great resource, I photocopied quite a few articles but I wish I had a set of them.

[Andrew Carr]

I was afraid that would be the answer.  I'm going to reach out to the NY Public Library but am not holding my breath.


Do you know of the images that Bob was referencing?  I would love to see them.

[BCrosby]

The cartoons (there are three of them) mocking Low and the new bunkers added to TOC in 1905 are reproduced in an article I did for Through the Green in 2011(?). DM me if you need a link. I will dig it out.


With a few exceptions, digitized issues of the British GI are not available to US based computers. They are available (as I understand it) to UK based computers. Reason: they are housed at the British Library and available only to British taxpayers, or something like that.


Agreed about the value of the British GI and other British periodicals of the era. There was nothing  comparable in the US in terms of golf/architectural topics covered nor in the quality of the writing. I have wondered if it is just a coincidence that the Golden Age of gca (if you allow me to peg its beginning date at 1905 or so) and a golden age of writing on golf ran more or less concurrently.


Bob       

[BCrosby]

I should have mentioned - the USGA has acquired digital copies of a run of the British GI from the Cambridge University Library (one of the eight depository libraries in the British Library system). Most of that run is comprised of issues from the 1920s. Under the terms of the USGA agreement with Cambridge U., access to them is limited to use by researchers at the USGA library.


Bob 

[Andrew Carr]

Is there a chance that they would share the cartoons you were referring to or do you have them?

[Adam Lawrence]

Is there a chance that they would share the cartoons you were referring to or do you have them?

TTG magazine is online — the archive is here — https://www.golfcollectors.co.uk/93

[Andrew Carr]

Adam, thank you but where is the archive?

[MCirba]

Adam Lawrence,


Thanks, I think.   My declining productivity level over the next few weeks thanks you, anyway.   

[Adam Lawrence]

Adam, thank you but where is the archive?

How irritating. The link went in the wrong place. I'll try to edit it...

[Andrew Carr]

Oh!  Totally missed that.  Thanks for editing.

Not to be daft, but this is Through The Green not Golf Illustrated.  Did you have another link to Golf Illustrated or were the cartoons that Bob was referring to in one of these Issues of TTG?

[Adam Lawrence]

GI is not online as far as I'm aware. The TTG article on John Low that Bob referenced in his post reproduced the cartoons. The article is briiliant too -- I've often quoted it.


Adam

[Andrew Carr]

Definitely need a second cup of coffee today!


Do you know which issue was that reproduced in?


It wouldn't be the end of the world for me to look at all of them and join in Mike's productivity level, but if you knew, it would be appreciated.

[Adam Lawrence]

Definitely need a second cup of coffee today!


Do you know which issue was that reproduced in?


It wouldn't be the end of the world for me to look at all of them and join in Mike's productivity level, but if you knew, it would be appreciated.

Bob's two Low pieces are in issues 90 and 93.

[Andrew Carr]

This is brilliant!  Thank you!

[Bret Lawrence]

Babel HathiTrust has a few copies of early Golf Illustrated volumes 1-17.  1899-1903


Here is a link to those digitized magazines:


https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/ls?q1=Golf+illustrated&field1=ocr&a=srchls&ft=ft&lmt=ft

[MCirba]

Thank you, Bret.


What fascinating reads!

[Bret Lawrence]

Mike,


Happy to share.  They also have many volumes of The Golfing Annual with dates into the 1880’s.  When you read the description of these Golfing Annuals, never believe the date you see on the search page.  Many of the volumes listed as 1999 are actually from the 1880’s-1890’s. Just click on some of the 1999 links to see the actual year.


https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/ls?q1=Golfing+Annual&field1=ocr&a=srchls&ft=ft&lmt=ft


Bret

[MCirba]

Mike,


Happy to share.  They also have many volumes of The Golfing Annual with dates into the 1880’s.  When you read the description of these Golfing Annuals, never believe the date you see on the search page.  Many of the volumes listed as 1999 are actually from the 1880’s-1890’s. Just click on some of the 1999 links to see the actual year.


https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/ls?q1=Golfing+Annual&field1=ocr&a=srchls&ft=ft&lmt=ft


Bret

Thanks, Bret.   Very compelling.