Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1910-09-16
Things You Want to Know Golf.

pick out some object 10 be hit from two
to five miles away from the starting point,
and the winner was the one who hit Il IN
the fewest number Of strokes. one OF the
favorite goals in this game was church
door one writer declares that all the
games in which a bali and club are the
prominent implements came about IN the
following way: A shepherd was watching
his sheep; a nice round stone was lying
beside his path. What more natural than
that he should take a crack at that stone
with his crook. When he did so, behold
it fell full into rabbit scrape Mary"
said he. 81 couldn't do that again II
tried" And sure enough he couldn't. Then
he asked his fellow shepherd II he could
do It. "Forsooth. that is easy" exclaimed
the latter just all men say whom they
see "a good player at golf make long
drive. Then they tried for a wager, then
increased the distance and used a tag
OF wool to mark the hole. Thus the
shepherds crook became the forerunner
OF the golf club. the tag OF wool the
predecessor of the marker at the hole. and
the rounded stone the harbnser OF the golf
ball.
The venerable age OF the game Of golf
is shown by the fact that before the dis
covery OF America the Scotch Parliament
ball and golf be utterly cryit doune." Laws
we're being passed continually in an effort
10 suppress the game on the ground that
it interfered with the practice OF archery,
then the principal means OF national de-
cense But when the use of gunpowder
ard muskets supplanted archery In war,
tho "unproftabill' sport fourished and the
laws against II were not enforced. Later
tue objections to golf were religious rather
than martial, and law was passed against
the ''prophanations" OF the Sabbath with
golf. As men became more liberal the
law allowed the golfers to enjoy their
game on Sunday afternoons, providing they
could show that they had attended preach
ing m the morning. otherwise they were
denied the privilege of playing at all on
the Sabbath.
BY the beginning OF the seventeenth CEN
tury golf had lived down its reputation as
an ''unprofitabl" sport and had ingratiated
itself in the heart of even King James vi.
who, I'm 1903, appointed William Mayne To
be during all the dayis OF his lyif-tyme
club-maker to his hieness" About this
same time there was an act passed by the
Scottish Parliament prohibiting the impor-
tation Of Dutch-made golf balls into Scot
land. This is one OF the first instances OF
the protective tariff principle being recog-
nized in the English-speak world. In
those days the balls were made of wet
feathers stuffed into a leather covering and
much skill was required In their making.
Later the gutta percha bah made a bid for
favor and all sorts of tactics were resorted
to in order to prevent its ascendancy. Many
ball-makers paid the caddies to gather up
all the gutta percha balls they could find,
But the gutta percha ball became so
strongly entrenched in the favor of the
players that those who had hitherto used
a basket of feathers and a piece of horse
hide in making a ball now changed 10 MAX
ing them Of gutta percha. IL was in those
same times that the game was played by
players attired in tall hats, swallow tail
coats and knee breeches. Such "A costume
on the links today would be amusing to
say the least.
One of the greatest players in the history
of the game was Alexander Mcclellan, who
won the title cock o. the green" He spent
his life on Bruntsfield links playing by
himself when he could find no opponent
Often he woHld practice at putting by lamp
light, and upon one occasion his golf
hating Wife annoyed by all-absorbing pas
sion, brought him his dinner and his night
cap. He was too absorbed in his game even
to appreciate this delicate satire.
Allen Robertson holds the reputation OF
being the greatest golfer that ever lived.
He never was beaten, and, though pro-
fesslonal, had the politeness of a Brummel
and the policy of a Tallyrand. For almost
a generation his record of full round on
the st. Andrews links in seventy nine
strokes never was touched. Not long ago
| Willie smith, American, made the
rounds on the same links in seventy-one
strokes. The records OF the game indicate
that although Britain is the home of mod
ern golf, Americans are as well equipped
as English players in their mastery of the
sport. 1t would be hard to determine
whether the American champion or the
British champion has the best of the argu-
ment when considering a long period of
| years.
romorrow-PowER BOATING.
BY FREDERIC J. HAsKIN.