The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1915-11-13

Chicago. Ill, Nov. 13.-The begin
ming of American golf is usually set
down as November Is, 1888, when
John Reid, the Father of American
Golf Joined with six other enterpris-
| ing and enthusiastic gentlemen and
formed the ST. Andrews Golf club.
The real start was somewhat earlier.
Robert Lockhart returned from his
annual trip to Scotland in the fall of
1882 and happening to meet John
Reid on the street in Yonkers, he in
formed him that he had brought from
Scotland some implements for playing
new game called golf" and invited
him to come to his residence and try
the game in the back yard.
These two men constructed an i'm
promptu six hole course in a pasture
belonging to H. o. Talmadge, another
resident of YOnkers. Talmadge was
invited to join the circle of players for
three reasons-he was a good fellow,
he became an enthusiast about the
game, and he owned the golf course.
Only Half a Dozen.
The number of golfers at this time
was perhaps half a dozen, and there
were only. fourteen or fifteen sticks in
the country, all owned and used by
this group. Those sticks had rings or
different color painted on them to dis
tinguish the clubs of one player from
those of another, and also to tell the
clubs apart, for the players OF those
days were not SO familiar with the
variations between the putter and the
driver as the present generation seems
to be-. The golf clubs of the old days
were fearful and wonderful things,
and four sticks were a good load for
any caddie.
too numerous for the pasture links,
and a new six hole course was laid out
on the east bank of the Hudson river,
where now some Yonkers manufactur-
ing plant is running full blast. 1t was
here that the famous Apple Tree
Gang came into existence
+ Apple Tree Club House.
The players derived this name from
the fact that their club house at this
course was a verdant apple tree; its
limbs were the clothes racks, its leaves
were awnings, and its fruit provided
the refreshment for the wearied play
erS.
Here were held the first tourna-
ments, and here, to quote the secre-
tarv of the newborn St. Andrews Golf
club, J. B. Upham, in the second
round Mrs Reid and Upham won
by one and one-half holes, and John
Reid beat Robert Lockhart, u to
PA" The John Reid gold medal was
played for in 1889 and won by P. C.
Myers No player was forced to wear
a high hat, but Prince AIoerts were
usually worn at tournaments,
and the membership of the St. An
drews Golf club so large that another
change was made, and a course was
laid out in the picturesque SawmiH
River valley, east of Yonkers. at a
place called Grey Oaks Many famous
matches were played here. but the
eyer-increasing interest in the game
forced the ST. Andrews players TO
move to the present location at Mount
Hope, where an eighteen-hole course
was laid out that has remained almost
unchanged to this day.
The roster of the club members
reads like Who's Who in America,
Andrew Carnegie has the same ad-
vantage at St Andrews that Francis
Ouimet enjoys at Brookline. Both
have cottages at the edge of the
course but the Laird of Skibbo says
his cottage must be of the wrong kind,
as he cannot get the distance that
Ouimet obtains. Edwin Gould owns
the first four hotels at ArdSley, but
prefers to play his golf at ST. An
drews. Certainly no one is better
qualified to deliver treatise on 1.-The
Psychology of Short Puts" than
Nicholas Murray Butler. If a new
hole is desired, there is Alfred Craven,
chief engineer for the public service
commission, to lay it out, and Major
John T. O'Rourke to construct it If
new rocking chair for the porch.
George F. Baker, A. Barton Hepburn,
Otto H. Kahn, Isaac Seligman, and
Mortimer L. Schiff may be trusted to
see that the movement is financially
sound. Charles NJ Schwab passes as
an expert on steel-faced clubs, and
John T. StiverS, former chief engineer