(By Andrew Carnegie)
(Readers will be interested to observe that in the following article Mr Andrew Carnegie puts into practice the theory of simplified spelling he has often advocated.)
The first golf club in the United States was organised at Yonkers, November 14, 18S8, and named Saint Andrew’s. Robert Lockhart, of Yonkers, born in Dunfermline, Scotland, was often in his nativ town as buying member of his firm, and there he lernt the ancient and royal game. Becoming a devotee, lie resolvd that his country should no longer be without this indispensable adjunct of high civilisation. He purchased several dozens of clubs in Dunfermline, and upon arrival at Yonkors explaind the game to his fellow crony Dunfermlinite, Jack Reid, and a few others, who began experimenting in Reid’s orchard, a larger -field, being afterwards secured. Jack Reid was elected president of the club,(Lockhart declining becaus he had to be abroad so much) “and John C. Ten Eyck, of; good Dutch stock, became: secretary which he still remains. Long life to him! Let it be recorded therefore, in the annals of time that the introduction of golf to America was the work of two Dunfermline – “bairns,” Lockhart arid Reid; both of Dunfermline, Scotland and of Yonkers, New York. The qualities of the American were, indeed, happily superimposed upon those of the Scot. The Dunfermline Scot is a brand of itself; one of the chief glories of Edinburgh. The modern metropolis, being that from the towering castle its citizens can behold the glorious place and abbey of the ancient capital, where rest the remains of The Bruce, Queen Margaret, and many of the royal folk. My parents have seen Sir Walter Scott sitting amid the ruins, busy writing and sketching.
We must never forget that Scotland also gave Episcopacy to the American Republic, for it was a Scotch bishop who declared he would consecrate a proper American candidate, and did so after English Churchrrien had refused. She also gave Wilson and Hamilton, the Federalist pioneers, the former the originator of the doctrin of implied powers in the Constitution. A precious trinity — Episcopacy, Federalism, and last, Golf, but who says the least of the three? We mite have moved along, successfully without Episcopacy, since we in the Republic are in the position of our British friends of whom the Frenchman exclaimed – “Mon Dieu! What a country! Fifty different religions and only one sauce!” But where could we find a substitute for golf? I notis a recent estimate of the money alredy expended in greens and clubhouses in the United States is fifteen millions of dollars.
The garrie of golf in my young days was the preserv of the upper classes in Scotland, sure mark of the gentleman, and a sickly plant south of the Border. No lady was ever seen on the links. The missionary; work in various lines which the northern member of the United Kingdom has performed for her Southern nabor is too large to recount, but in the South the noble game now ranks high, its most notable exponent being the Scotch ex-Prime Minister and leader of the Conservativs Mr Balfour, a “pawkie chiel” as Scotch as brose. The writer red that at a recent conference of political leaders, when the present dangerous position of hereditary Peers had produced profound silence, Mr Balfour restored hilarity by proposing to change ‘the subject and take up the real pressing question of the age – “How to keep on the line of the putt!”
The charm of golf, who can analyse and decide in what it really consists? First we need to use the plural. It has not one, but a score of charms. We are under the sky, worshippers of the “God of the Open Air.” Every breth seems to drive away weakness and diseas-arid diseas, securing for us longer terms of happy days here on earth, even bringing something of heven here to us. No doctor like Dr Golf—his cures are as miraculous as those sometimes credited to Christian Science, minus its unknown arid mysterious agencies which are calculated to alarm prudent people. Not the least of the virtues of golf is its power to affect the temper and especially the tung. We hav only to remain silent to produce unusual results. The preventiv treatment, successfully applied, has its richest field upon the green. There was a pictur in [Punch recently in which a caddie following a player was haild by the other caddies, “Where are you going, Sandy?” “I’m going to hear this gentleman play golf.” Clever lads, some of the caddies!
A real duffer of noble presence was on a practis game alone. Repeatedly he had foozled in his attempts to drive and finally exclaimed, “Well, I never foozled like this before!” Caddie, astonish, “Your honor has played before?” A cousin of mine made his first trial one morning on Skibo links, and, as is often the case when taking it all easily and not trying hard, he succeeded wonderfully. He could hardly wait for the morning game. We started and he foozled everything, and at last I herd exclamations, and called out to him, “What nation’, Morrison?” He replied apologetically, “I know, I know, I felt it, but I didn’t think I said it.” We have a celebrated professor who was lost from site for a time. His caddie at last came in site, and being askt, “Where’s the professor?” cald out, “He’s down among the whins talkin to hissel.” A deacon was reported as having resigned from his office in the kirk. Being askt why he did so by his minister, he explained that he had either to resign or quit playing golf, and he knew he couldn’t do that.
Skibo links have some celebrities whose first efforts at golf began there. Frederic Harrison had been initiated one morning and was playing his first match. When he was foozling his way to the long hole for some time I turned round and asked, “How many?” “Three,” he replied. I had seen him miss frequently. After three and seven had each been affirmd several times by the players, they proceeded to locate the strokes. After getting in a few “air strokes” in counting the seven, Harrison exclaimed, “Oh, make it twenty if you count these; I only hit the ball three times!”
There are games and games. Does a game make friends closer and dearer to each other, or does it arouse ill-feeling and jealousy and drive men apart, as rivals, even foes, each grudging the success of the other? We often hear accounts of the rivalries aroused by some of our games, football, especially, and very naturally so, playd as it is with us when men roll on the ground attempting to disabled each other. The reverse is the case with golf. Men become dearer friends than ever; the offener they meet on the green, the fonder they become of each other and the greater the longing for their chum’s society, and in after years, if separated, each warms as the name of the others mentioned, and ends his panegyric with the ever- entrancing words murmured with emotion, “Ah, we played golf together! “Short, simple, sufficient! Golf gives us intervals for exchange of mutual thoughts which strengthen the ties between us. We rejoice to see that our chums are playing well, and applaud their success, golf is a game entirely free from physical struggles over opponents– the ineradicable root of evil in football.
No game givs so much as the open air, the elixir of life from morning till night. With a modest bite at luncheon, mayhap, it can be played without undue fatigue even by elderly people, and then there is the few minutes rest and the chat at the green with your bosom crony. No delay impairs the game. Sit and moralise. Drive off at your pleasure; it’s all the same.
Another special feature of the ground game is that, forgetting all other subjects, attention must be concentrated upon it. This is what takes the cobwebs out of the brain; hunger, thirst, cold or heat, business cares, sublime soarings, all take a back seat when the critical moment arrives and all depends upon the last part.
I was a very late convert to the noble game of golf. Well do I remember laughing at the first attempts of some guests to drive wee balls into wee holes in some parts of the park at Skibo. One day a noted golfer and cup- winner, Mr Morrison, Librarian, Edinburgh, came to me there, all aglow, his eyes sparkling, and announced in rapid accents, panting for breath, his remarkable find. “Do you know you have a natural golf course at the bottom of the park between the Loch and the Firth? Certain, no possible mistake. What a find! “And my friend awaited my reply in an attitude which seemed to express wonder that I had not fainted at this startling discovery, this supreme gift of Providence which made Skibo perfect, leaving nothing else to be desired. We had to be careful not to shock our friend by seeming indifference, and did the best we could conceal the latent smile. This was only eleven years ago. Morrison was told to work it up and Skibo links is the result, and such links! Along one side is a salmon loch, seagulls nesting up on an island in the center “where scream the wild sea- mew” as they flutter around; the salt Firth along the other side; scores of skylarks nesting along the edges of the links and filling the air with their thrills as they mount.
The links cost money, but we ask ourselves what amount of money would induce us to part with this special attraction which givs more plesure to more of our visitors than any other one feature of our life in the Highlands. The links which we laft at have rendered us the crank Morrison’s dettor forever, and he is not much of a crank after all.
My nefews play and win prizes; and upon our visits to our gifted sister’s Cumberland Island I saw the effect of the game upon devotees of our family. Nevertheless, i was persuaded to try one drive or two just to be in the fashion. Then another, and lo and behold, before i knew it, the temter had me in his toils and I became not a play-of, but at golf, which I am still and shall forever remain. Beginning at sixty-three, what can one expect! I try to make good bargains with real players, and the number of strokes some generous souls allow me giv me a game now and then. Sometimes dire suspicion lurks about the explanations for certain extraordinary failures they make, even when the handicaps are liberal, but not wishing to embarrass my liberal colleags, I accept the situation, smiling to myself, nevertheless.
I am tolerable nowadays upon the green, but the long strait drive is beyond my reach.
I am blest with a clever sister-in-law, “The Commodore,” mother of nine nefews and nieces, who, captivated by the game, has her own Links. She soon found the absolute necessity for some expletiv which could be indulged in with immunity, more especially since she could not restrain herself from giving vent to an expletiv now and then which was really wicked, and preyed upon her conscience. She appealed to me in her extremity, and I suggested that when she foozled so badly that something had to be said for immediate relief she should try “Potsdam, Rotterdam, and Amsterdam,” which she agred to do. Relief proved only transitory, and she finally confest to me she found it too long Something shorter and more concentrated was absolutely necessary in extreme cases. Not long afterwards she confest to me she had returned to her old favorite short but expressive expletive. Remonstance prevailed and she agreed to compromise upon a simplified spelling which eliminated the “v”. Even with solid Presbyterian Scotsman today this renders the word “The De’il” wholly innocuous. I beg to recommend it to troubled souls as yielding more, at less risk, than any remedy. No copyright!
Saint Andrew’s Club, as we have seen, has two distinguished Dunfermline members as its founders. There is a third who is distinguished for being allowed more strokes in his favor in Match games than the other than any other members of the club.
DR GOLF. Oamaru Mail, Volume XXXIX, Issue 10824, 22 July 1911, Page 3 (Supplement)