Golf
has seen an incredible rise in popularity over the past few decades, and that
popularity continues to grow. From the days when golf was consider the pastime
of a select few old folks who walked the greens in their checked pants, the
sport today has a tremendous following. It can largely be attributed to players
like Tiger Woods – charismatic players who captured the attention of everyone,
including those who have never picked up a golf club. Added to this is
Hollywood’s take with movies that have portrayed golfers as the heroes they
are.
While
the following has changed significantly, so has the industry. There are resorts,
vacation packages and even housing developments built around incredible golf
courses. Finding a great place to golf has never been easier with the number of
courses growing annually and those managing the courses set to make the most of
the property available. There’s no way to really tell what prompted the rising
popularity of the sport. But if you look at the number of young people walking
the greens with parents and grandparents, and the number of schools with a golf
program for its students, you’ll see that it’s most likely a trend that will
continue for the foreseeable future.
The
History of Golf
Arguably
golf’s interesting origin began five centuries in the past. It is a historical
fact that due to the interference of golf with much more serious combat drills
James II of Scotland banned golf in an act of Parliament on March 6 in the year
1457.
There is general agreement among historians and golf fans alike that the
Scots were the first golfers who became somewhat addicted to the sport. However
the persons responsible for the invention of golf is open to debate. And debate
will ensue if you breech the subject with the right persons.
It
has been suggested that bored sheepherders became quite exceptional at knocking
round shaped stones into rabbit holes with their wooden shepherds staffs. Making
a competitive game of the boredom seemed inevitable. After all women’s lib was
not yet even considered so that means the shepherds were men. Lets face another
fact of history, men tend to be more of a competitive nature. Various forms of
golf were played as early as the fourteenth century. These games were played in
Holland, Belgium, France as well as in Scotland, thus the debate of golf’s
origin is rightly fueled.
There
is another historical fact that Scottish Baron, James VI, was the man who
delivered the game we know today as golf to the English. For many years the game
was played on severely rugged terrain, where no proper upkeep was required. In
most accounts golf was played with crudely cut holes in the ground where the
earth was reasonably flat.
It
was a group of Edinburgh golfers who first formed an organized club. In 1744 the
Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers was established. At this time in history
the first thirteen laws of golf were drawn up for an annual competition. This
first competition consisted of players from any part of Great Britain or
Ireland.
One
of the earliest golf clubs that were formed outside golf’s debatable native
home of Scotland was the Royal Blackheath Golf Club of England. Blackheath came
into existence in 1766 and the Old Manchester Golf Club was founded on the
Kersal Moor in 1818.
By
the late 1800’s the Royal Montreal Club and the Quebec Golf Club were to
become the first in North America. It wasn’t until 1888 that golf resurfaced
in the United States with more fervor than each prior surfacing. Even then it
was a Scotsman, John Reid, who first built a three-hole course in Yonkers New
York. St. Andrews Club of Yonkers was built in a thirty-acre site near to the
original three-hole course.
From
the hesitant and fitful start golf grew rapidly as the new national pastime in
America. Modern for its time the golf club, Shinnecock Hills was founded in 1891
and in the nine years left in that century more than one thousand prestigious
golf clubs opened in North America.
The
historical value of golf is as interesting as any part of our heritage.
Following the path that golf took to get from a shepherds field to the amazing
golf courses that dot our culture today it is no wonder golf remains a popular
pastime in all parts of the world.
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