"He was active until the last second"

/
138.jpgThe Dallas Morning News' Brad Townsend and Bill Nichols pen the best of the obits on Byron Nelson.
Nelson's wife Peggy came home from a Bible class around 12:30 p.m. and found her husband on the porch, longtime friend and business manager Jon Bradley said.

"He had been gone for a while," Bradley said.

He said Peggy told him Nelson was feeling good Tuesday morning, and may have been headed for his golf cart when he collapsed.

"He was active until the last second," he said.
Richard Goldstein writes the New York Times obituary and Thomas Bonk pens the LA Times version.

SI digs up Walter Bingham's 1995 piece detailing the win streak.

Of course, Dan Jenkins contends that it was actually 13.

Byron Nelson, R.I.P.

/

nelson_byron.jpgOne of the greats passes away.

Unfairness of Furrowed Bunkers

/

230136-350961-thumbnail.jpg
(click to enlarge)A few of you emailed to ask about yesterday's Bobby Jones quote on furrowed bunkers.

Since some form of furrowing is taking place at Muirfield Village this week, I thought you might want to read the entire article, which appeared in The American Golfer and was later reprinted in a magazine style publication called Bobby Jones On Golf, which was reprinted again by Sid Matthew. It's a must if you don't have it and love Jones's writings (though I'm afraid it's out of print looking at Amazon).

Anyway, click on the window to read his take on Oakmont's furrowed bunker raking. You'll probably have to print it out, as I had to resize it to fit the screen.
 

Crenshaw's Shot

/
Ben Crenshaw pens an SI Golf Plus My Shot on Ben Hogan and Colonial:
Mr. Hogan wasn't one to hold back his opinions, even if they hurt your feelings. Back then I had a driver that I loved, and one day he asked to look at it. He held it up at an angle and examined it on all sides. Finally he said, "That's the worst driver I've ever seen." Man, that killed me, but that was the way he was.

Turnberry Turns 100

/
turnberry-lighthouse.jpgTom English pens a nice overview of Turnberry's 100th birthday for Scotland on Sunday.

In the Second World War the government commandeered the golf course just as they had in the First. They made a military air station of it, put 1,200 men on site and told those who wanted to know that golf had probably had its day at Turnberry. The links had survived one conflict. It was unlikely to survive a second.

The bulldozers moved in. Greens were ploughed up and several thousand tonnes of concrete and tarmac were poured on to fairways to make runways.
How times have not changed...they're revving up the dozers again.
It's a challenge that is going to get stiffer by the time 2009 comes around. It would have been appropriate for Turnberry to host the Open in this their 100th year but change was needed there. Foul weather defended the course against the bombers of today but you'd fear for it if the modern pros cut loose in dry conditions. The fear is they'd tear it to pieces. The game has changed a lot since Nick Price won there in 1994. Apart from the infrastructure around the course, they needed to toughen-up the Ailsa.

The changes are pretty radical, even if the R&A has asked for some of them to be undone. They were concerned the new and extensive bunkering on some holes was too penal and would force players to go defensive off the tee. Some have been filled in completely, others have been made less deep. Still, there will be approaching 30 new traps when the Open returns there and about 200 extra yards to negotiate.

The most dramatic alteration is the shifting of the 10th tee 50 yards to the left. Dinna Fouter now requires a 220-yard carry over the sea to find the fairway. Anything remotely hooky will end up wet. It's a hole to challenge the signature ninth, with all the stunning views of the lighthouse and the Ailsa Craig. It is a vision that brings to mind Henry Longhurst's plaintive words in troubled times.

"In those long periods inseparable from wartime service when there is nothing to do but sit and think," he wrote, "I often used to find myself sitting and thinking of the time when once again we might be playing golf at Turnberry."

China Unveils Its Evidence

/

That whole China invented golf story? Well the plot thickens, at least according to Reuters:

An exhibition of three replica paintings depicting nobility playing a golf-like game unveiled at Beijing's Great Hall of the People this week backs the claim that modern golf is derived from an ancient sport called Chuiwan.

The paintings are said to have been stored at Beijing's Imperial Palace Museum and date back to the Yuan (1271-1368) and Ming (1368-1644) dynasties.

"China's ancient Chuiwan, whether in the equipment, the course and the rules -- even in the etiquette -- is very similar to modern golf," Li Yong, deputy secretary of China Golf Association (CGA), told reporters.

"Not only was it played much earlier than (Scotland's) 15th century golf, it's also earlier than other countries' similar ancient golf games. Thus, we can absolutely say that China's ancient Chuiwan is the mother of modern golf."

The replica paintings depict scenes of imperial nobility standing near small, round balls and holding sticks reminiscent of golf clubs.

The other item of evidence offered was a copy of Wan Jing -- a book published in 1282 and reading like a beginner's textbook on golf, according to experts.

Finding Strath

/

Mike Clayton writes in The Age about Melbourne golfer Noel Terry and his discovery of David Strath's grave in Australia, solving one of golfs great mysteries.

Strath's golfing story is an interesting one. He was the rival and friend of the greatest player of the time, Young Tom Morris, who won the Open Championship four times in a row from 1868 to 1872 (there was no championship in 1871). The pair toured Scotland and as far south as Liverpool in England playing exhibition matches, sometimes in front of 10,000 people.

They were the superstars of their time and are credited with popularising the game. Strath was runner-up to Morris in the Open Championships of 1870 and 1872 and in 1876 he tied for the championship at St Andrews but refused to play off because of a rules dispute.

That Open was a shambles as someone had forgotten to book the golf course and players were competing amongst the regular public players. Strath's long approach to the 17th green had hit a spectator on the green and there were protests that he had somehow gained an advantage. He was asked to play off for the title with the undertaking that the question would be settled when an official was available to adjudicate.

Strath refused, reasoning there was little point if he was going to have the crown taken away in the following days.

"Settle it now or I won't be here in the morning" was his not-unreasonable request.

Roman Soldiers: Golf Inventors?

/

roman-soldiers-punic.gifThanks to reader Chris for the heads up on the response in the British Isles to recent claims that China was the home of golf, not Scotland.

Now it seems Roman soldiers invented a form of golf that the Scots formalized, sending HBO and the BBC back to the storyboards for a revamp to season two of Rome.

Jim McBeth writes:

THEY came, they saw, they played a neat chip shot onto the edge of the green. More than a millennium before golf is said to have been invented in Scotland, Roman soldiers were playing the game, according to experts.

Trumping recent claims that the game was being played in China in AD943, academics have chipped in with a theory that the game was actually imported to Scotland by the foot soldiers of Emperor Severus.

The Roman version of golf was called paganica, and was first recorded in 30BC as a generic ball game. However, by the time of the Roman invasion of Scotland, it was played with a curved stick used to strike a feather-filled leather ball. The ball was hit towards a predetermined target such as a tree, the aim being to strike the “mark” in the fewest strokes.

Michael Whitby, a historian at Warwick University, said: “Legionaries were in Scotland from the AD140s. The Emperor Severus was on the Fife Peninsula and, significantly, there was an important marching camp near St Andrews.

“A legacy of games, such as paganica, would have been left. The roots of golf would have passed through the 8th century to the medieval university folk and aristocrats.”

Malcolm Campbell, a leading golf writer, agreed: “Paganica is the earliest form of a game we could recognise as golf. After the Romans left, it evolved and in the 15th century the Scots uniquely formalised it. The game was truly ‘invented’ in Scotland, with a little help from the Romans.”


Golf Started In China?!

/

p1_montychina.jpgRichard Starnes in the Ottawa Citizen writes:

A leading academic says he has proof golf was played in China 500 years before it was first reported in Scotland, which is widely acknowledged as the game's home.

Professor Ling Hongling of Lanzhou University says he has unearthed clear references to golf in a book called the Dongzuan Records, which were compiled during the Song Dynasty (AD 960-1279). There are even sketches.

Ling says the book also refers to a prominent Nantang Dynasty magistrate (AD 937-975) who told his daughter "to dig goals in the ground so that he might drive a ball into them with a purposely crafted stick." The fact the "sticks" were jewel-encrusted suggests the game was for the nobleman, not the commoner.

Jewel-encrusted sticks. A game for the nobleman. So now we know: blame the Chinese.

Thanks to reader Al for the heads up.