The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-02-25

uEE-AEaNA5 lAo1L 1ACaa ouAAAS-IANc
 Amateurs Who Did it Last Season.
 Lucky dog!" is the golfing conn ment on the player who holes out on the too shot. Should the hoIlng out in one occur in a medal play competition and the player happen to be the win ner, the congratulations extended to him are usually of the ironical order, while if it happens at match play the opponent may become his enemy for life. The freak of fortune generally occurs under circumstances that do not benefit the player. however, in either way. The achievement, too, adds no special distinction to the mak- CTS reputation as player. The one | tangible outcome is that by club law | the player is fined a bottle of whiskey, which means that there will be an 'open house. for the members that day at the expense of the wonder worker. In Great Britain the caddie receives the bottle of whiskey.
 One of the paradoxica1 things about golf is that if a player drives to the green, and then narrowly misses hol- Ing out in one put, every one says, 'Hard luck There Is feeling that he has been deprived of reward just ly due to his good drive, yet when, af- ter the equally good drive, the ball happens to fall into the cup, the per formance is only greeted with laugh ter and mocking cheers. k sa. .., ,,.
 It is almost as wonderful to hole out a full shot for two or three, yet such an achievement does not carry with it any such derisive applause. People marvelled when George Ormiston hoIed cleek shot for two in beating Walter J. Travis in the amateur cham pionship, and there was a similar wave of wonder when J. D. Foot holed 8 brassey shot for three on the six hundred and thirty yard hole last spring at Garden City, but each feat seemed to be classed as a plucky and well earned one. The explanation may be that there is an existent pos sibility, however faint, of a player hol- ing on a shot from off the green, but to hole. from the tee Is utterly unex- lpected. Humor, some one has said, lies in the unexpected. When con- fronted with this climax of the unex- lpected, a hole in one, all emotions are blurred in the golfing beholder save that of laughter. j., ..
 No player ever hopes,s no matter how vast his talent for castle build ling, to hole out from the tee. As well might one set a trap in the back lyard to- catch a meteor and hope to find one there in the morning, Tn all of the competitions and Informal gol- : fing on the fifty links within the Me- tropelitan Golf association territory last year, but three duly authenticated instances of a hole in one; have been returned, but two Methopolitan Golf . association players also gained the re cord in the Berkshires. George Smith, the professional, made the fourth hole, of one hundred and ninetyseigilt yards in one at the Oakland, Cal, links, and ] there have been other instances of the phenomenal doubtless aside from the live. cases specified, but the data are meagre. a, x< #
 To recount the Metropolitan Golf as, sociation occurrences of the sort, in April James A. Tyng had the luck on the two hundred year third hole at Baltusrol; in August c. B. Adams made the record at the one hundred land sixty-second yard fifth hole at Shinnecock Hills, in the open handi- leap. The other instances of hole in lone were in September when J. l.. E. lPell, the drive being across the Hpusa- tonic river, reached the cup on one hundred and fifty-third yard hole; lJudge Frederick Stevenson, in round Iwith the Rev. W. M. Hughes. made !the score on the seventeenth hole at Morris county, the distance being one hundred and sixty-five yards, and when D. T. Dana made the two huna dred and thirteen yard second hole at ILenox. How may the marvellous nature of such a, feat be brought home to the lnon-golfer? The distance of the third hole at Baltusrol is six hundred feet, while, according to the city surveys, it Is six hundred and thirteen feet on a Istreet block from Avenue A to First lavenue and six hundred and ten feet from Second to Third avenue. A golf hole is four and a quarter inches in di- ameter and golf ball a scant two linches in diameter. Placing a ball on Ia pinch of sand, to get a fair whack at it, Tyng struck it so fairly that it lcarried about as far as one of the above street blocks and fell, after a short roll, into the hole. .....
 The diameter of the hole is about that of an ordinary tea cup, which, if set up as target, a sharpshooter would be tickled to hit after a careful aim at the distance, The golfer, of course, took no special aim, for the hole, but was trying to make the put lting green, which is fifty feet in diam eter. This, by custom, puts Tyng's lfeat into the realm of luck, while the hit of the marksman would be a tri- bute to skill, yet the comparison may show the wonderful character of the golfing exploit at Baltusrol and in the other instances.
 At Baltusrol, in the amateur cham pionship, there were one. hundred and thirty-three starters In the medal play round, yet the scores of the two lead CTS in the three rounds at, this hole ' and