Q&A With Roger McStravick, Author Of St Andrews: In The Footsteps Of Old Tom Morris

/

Q: This is an ambitious book given that the primary focus, Old Tom Morris, has been gone for some time. What got you interested in him and as the book’s title announces, the town?

 

My first connection with Old Tom was watching David Joy perform his stage show as Old Tom in St Andrews. I was utterly gripped. I wanted to learn more and then read the novel Tommy’s Honour. The real eureka moment was reading Tom Morris of St Andrews, The Colossus of Golf. It really set a new benchmark for golf history books. The level of detail and presentation was phenomenal.

 

Living in St Andrews, I began to see that there was very little of the town’s history on show. By that I mean you could walk around St Andrews and not realise that for example at the end of North Street lived the winners of 5 Opens and the sons of people who lived there, doors from each other, won a further 7 Opens and an Amateur Championship. It is a truly remarkable place and I wanted to share that un-told history.

 

 

Q: Give us a sense how long it took to put the images together, the variety of sources and the issues faced?

The book took about 3 years including writing, researching and tracking original photographs. There are so many people that helped including relations of the great golfing families and landowners in St Andrews. However the majority of the images came from the R&A, St Andrews Preservation Trust and the University of St Andrews. I was very fortunate to have a lot of good will and support from the get go. Some of my favourite images include the photo of Tom’s first shop taken circa 1850 and also unseen paintings, like the one of James Cheape, the man who saved the St Andrews golf course for evermore. The biggest issue was deciding what to leave out. Chic Harper, the designer, did a great job. My aim was to make golf history visual, beautiful and accessible and I think he captured the brief perfectly.

 

 

Q: Am I correct that by putting all of these vital historic images of the town and golfers, especially Old Tom, that the images suggest they knew they were in a special place and documenting a special time? 

I think you are right in saying that they knew it was a special time.  I say in the book that Old Tom was fortunate to be born at the right time and he truly was.  Hugh Lyon Playfair had taken a filthy run down St Andrews in the 1830s, with the West Sands beach eroding the 1st hole, cow dung piled high on the streets and yet some 30 years later it is a renowned golfing metropolis.

 

With Playfair’s vision coming into reality with Edinburgh’s New Town type housing, land reclamation down the first hole (by dumping rubbish on the beach and covering with soil…and that is why the 1st hole is flat), luxurious hotels and the railway line, St Andrews was re-born. It had been a successful and thriving place of pilgrimage but when the cathedral was felled after John Knox’s speech, the town slipped into decline for centuries.

 

Tom was born as the town was beginning to blossom once more. He and Allan Robertson were golf’s first superstars. Allan was always considered the Champion Golfer. I like to think of them as brothers and not as employer and apprentice as most historians have noted them. They were only 6 years apart age wise. They were written about in the press and were acknowledged to be the best golfers in Scotland and thereby the world. In a harsh Victorian world, golf was kind to them and gave them a good living. It was Allan’s death aged 43 that led to the creation of The Open. Who is the new Champion Golfer? The era that followed was built largely upon the St Andrews dynamic. The evolution of photography and the growth of St Andrews happened at the same time and we are fortunate that so many images were taken to document that golden era.

 

 

Q: If you had to list his most important contributions to the game, Old Tom’s greatest gifts to golf?  Promoter? Architect? Clubmaker? Role in The Open?

 

Tom was truly inspiring. If I had to rank his greatest gifts to golf in order, I would say golfer, architect and then promoter.

 

As a golfer, he was the best in the world - a superstar of the Victorian age. He won The Open four times and crowds were never quite so boisterous as they were when Old Tom played Willie Park Sr. of Musselburgh. Thousands flocked to those grand matches.

 

People tend to see Tom as the old guy with the beard. I think more about the 30 year old, who had no idea which direction his life would go, but hoping above everything to not have to work the weave or be a letter carrier like his father. As a golfer, he was human too – he had the yips and they plagued him until his later non-competitive years. Once when a letter was sent to the ‘misser of short putts’ at Prestwick, it found its way to him.

 

People get quite sniffy about Old Tom as an architect of golf courses, but I would suggest that the list of the courses he set out is still a strong list of over 70 courses that includes, Muirfield, Prestwick, Carnoustie, Royal County Down and Cruden Bay. He effectively created the front 9 of the Old Course by clearing away lots of the whin to reveal the fairway we play on today. His 1st and 18th greens are still causing the pros trouble today.

 

Finally as a promoter, Tom was a strong supporter of both ladies golf and generally spreading the game worldwide. When he created the Himalayas putting course for the ladies, this was frowned upon but nevertheless under the guidance of the R&A, Tom ploughed up the whin and created the popular putting green. It was said that clubmakers who traveled to the States with a letter of endorsement from Old Tom were sure to get a job. He was so revered in his own lifetime.

 

To this list could be added many more contributions to golf including businessman, official starter, course maintenance, contributor to golf books/magazines, but I think as a player in his prime he was the the best of all.

 

 

Q: What most surprised you in your research?

I was absolutely delighted to find lots of images that have never been seen before. Some of the 19th century paintings are glorious and I am truly grateful to the families and organisations that allowed them to be seen in print for the first time. There was also a wealth of manuscripts that have really have not been looked at for many years - first hand accounts of St Andrews in the 1870s.

 

It will take me a few years to do anything on the scale of Footsteps but there may be a few St Andrews books in the interim. The archives available to research in St Andrews are truly world class.

 

 

Q: There are many other figures you include in the book, who intrigues you most from those vital years at St. Andrews?

 

St Andrews popularity grew thanks to a unique combination of the golf course, R&A/Union Club, hotels, restaurants and the genuine beauty and history of the location. There are quite a few people who came together to create the St Andrews we know. However, I think that Playfair above all others absolutely fascinates me. How he managed to do what he did, when the locals were despondent at best about their run down town, is a truly wonderful achievement. He came back from India very wealthy (as did many…best not ask), having worked for the East India Company and used his money where needed to clean up the streets. Instead of ramshackle streets with porches and archways jutting out onto the pavement, he got them all removed. (This is where the name Principal’s Nose comes from as Playfair cut off the porch way that belonged to Principal Haldane of the University, who didn’t have a big nose, as is often told). The result was the clear clean lines of South, Market and North Street. Add to that the first golf club house in the Union Club, the R&A building, the saving of the 1st hole from the sea, the railway line and station and the town hall. The list goes on and on. He was a hugely important man who had more than a few folk standing in his way, but nevertheless succeeded. George Bruce who created the Bruce Embankment wrote scathingly about Playfair in Wrecks and Reminiscences and it is a fun read given how vitriolic Bruce can be.  However, the results of Playfair’s sheer determination and work are still being enjoyed today.

 

When we look to the success of St Andrews, Old Tom played a hugely important role and as mentioned was a Victorian superstar. He was undoubtedly a phenomenal golfing talent. One final example to illustrate this was that he shot a 79 on the St Andrews links. Over 30 years later, when the golfers were playing the easier routing with the new front 9 that we play today, Amateur Champion Willie Tait beat reigning Open Champion Willie Auchterlonie with an 86. They were still struggling to match his score.

 

Old Tom Morris was simply outstanding by all accounts and that is why people continue to be fascinated by a man apart.

Read More

Poll: Spieth Wins PGA, Greatest Year In Modern Majors?

/

As noted in Golf World and debated on Morning Drive, Jordan Spieth has a chance to join Ben Hogan and Tiger Woods as three-out-of-four major winners in one year. A win also gives Woods a strong run for the best single year in major play.

My question: would Spieth’s Win-Win-T4-Win match Tiger’s 2000 5th-Win-Win-Win? (This assumes no runaway win by Spieth, which seems unlikely given the form of so many players with good vibes at Whistling Straits.)

Damon Hack noted in our Morning Drive debate the size of Tiger’s winning scores as evidence of Woods-2000 remaining the greatest single season performance in majors. Call it the Secretariat factor.

Ben Hogan won the '53 Triple Crown, choosing to play The Open over the PGA. Got him a ticker-tape parade, so I'm including it too as an option for the non-millennials.

Even if Spieth just finishes in the top five, he becomes just the fourth player in history to finish fifth or better in the season's majors (Rickie in '14, Woods twice, Nicklaus twice). Pretty incredible.

What say you?

If Jordan Spieth wins the PGA, greatest year in the modern majors?
 
pollcode.com free polls

Gullane Must: Archie Baird's Heritage Of Golf Museum

/

Any golfers who have been to Scottish Open host Gullane only get the complete experience by visiting Archie Baird's Heritage of Golf museum.

While I'm not on the grounds yet at Gullane and am unsure what the museum's status is within the tournament setup, this Brandon Tucker story gives a nice synopsis of Archie's tribute to the game.

Baird especially enjoys talking about the golf ball, which went from an expensive, feather-core ball to a cheaper, more mass-produced ball made of a black, gum-like Gutta-Percha, just after 1850. This allowed the number of golf clubs in the world to go from just a handful to thousands by 1900.

The tour ends rather abruptly, as Baird notes:

"Then the modern, rubber-core ball came along in the 1920s, courses had to adapt to it, and I lost interest. Any questions?"

That's our man!

Here's a video taken by some American visitors...

Putting The (Incredibly Rare) Modern Grand Slam Into Perspective

/

He's got the first two legs of the Grand Slam. Yet, perhaps because he's been on vacation, there has been too little chatter about where this feat puts Jordan Spieth's year headed into St. Andrews.

Five before him have technically had a "chance" to win the modern Grand Slam of golf, only three men legitimately had a shot. As Victor Mather presented the Grand Slam story a week ago in the New York Times, Ben Hogan's opportunities in 1951 and 1953 were compromised by scheduling.

That leaves Arnold Palmer in 1960, Jack Nicklaus in 1972, Tiger Woods in 2002 and now Jordan Spieth in 2015 with a chance to win the Grand Slam after winning the first two modern majors.

Pretty heady company.

In 1951, Ben Hogan took the first two majors. But he would have faced a significant hurdle for a Grand Slam: The British Open started a day after the P.G.A. ended. After sustaining terrible injuries in a car crash in 1949, Hogan played a light schedule, and in the end he elected not to compete in the last two majors.

In 1953, after once again winning the Masters and the U.S. Open, he did travel to Scotland to play in the only British Open of his career. He won, but once again could not play in the P.G.A. because the events overlapped. That was the only time a Masters and U.S. Open winner also won the British Open. It was Hogan’s ninth, and final, major victory.

Though the victory was front-page news, there was not much hand-wringing over his missing the P.G.A.; the modern concept of the Grand Slam would not solidify in the public’s mind until the early 1960s.
Arnold Palmer, who often spoke about his desire to win the Grand Slam, won the first two legs in 1960. He came close in the British Open that year, losing to Kel Nagle by a stroke.

Jack Nicklaus’s turn came in 1972. Like Palmer, he missed a British Open win by a stroke, losing to Lee Trevino.

After Palmer and Nicklaus, it took 30 years and the emergence of another of the game’s greatest golfers to get another Masters-U.S. Open winner. In 2002, Tiger Woods won his seventh and eighth majors and went into the British Open alive for the Slam. But he shot an 81 on Saturday in terrible conditions, and wound up tied for 28th.

As for the "other" Grand Slam won by Bobby Jones in 1930, he kicked it off with a 7&6 win at The Old Course over the vaunted Roger Wethered.

The highlights show him hitting quite the miraculous Road bunker recovery...

Nicklaus: "I think I underachieved all my life"

/

Jack Nicklaus held court today at The Memorial, launching the 40th edition of the tournament he founded by honoring Nick Faldo and journalism lifetime achievement honorree Doc Giffin. Before that ceremony, however, the Golden Bear took questions from the media.

Doug Ferguson kicks off his AP notes column with Nicklaus' view that he was a constant underachiever and how that shaped his approach to the game.

"I think that if you feel you're overachieving, or getting more out of what you should get, then you stop working," Nicklaus said. "I always feel like I'm never getting what I should be getting out of what I'm doing. So you've got to work harder to make sure you do that. I always wanted to climb a mountain. I always wanted to get better. ... So I just tried not to believe anything about what I would read or what I would hear or what I even thought.

"I still don't think I achieved what I could have achieved in my career."