Evening star., 1939-01-15
Good for Two Shots
A Round Reduction
On Most Cards
Fine Courses Making
Game Too Easy, Is
Suruzen's View
By WALTER McCALLUM.

BY WALTER McCALLUM.
Probably the average golfer doesn't
realize what has happened to i'm
prove his game since the day he first
broke the century mark and set 'em
up for the locker room gang. But if
he did he'd feel honor-bound to toss
an assist to the unsung hero of golf
the greenskeeper, or course super
visor, or whatever swanky title you
want to hang on the gent who keeps
your golf course in immaculate
shape.
There's nothing new about any
country club employing an expert to
keep carefully manicured fairways
and immaculate putting greens in
condition. That's been done for
years. But over the last few decades
1t has been done more intelligently
and with greater attention to detail
and finer results than ever before.
Only the old-timers in the game re-
call the days when putting greens
simply were cleared spots, little bet
ter than the Well-groomed tees and
fairWays of today and when bunkers
hardly were raked from one month
to another.
Greenskeepers Reduce Scores.
Around 1927 the United States
Golf Association got the idea of or
ganizing a so-called greens section
Enlisting the whole-hearted support
of such pioneers in greenskeeping
science as Profs. C. V. Piper and R.
A. Oakley, with the support of the
Secretary of Agriculture, the ma
tional links body started Coop
erative movement that has spread
until today greenskeeping is fairly
close to an exact science They
haven't conquered all grass diseases
and never may, but they have made
a long start. Much of the improve
ment has come in technique, aided
by the equipment manufacturers,
but much of it also has come from
the greenskeepers themselves, the
men who get out at dawn to see that
brown patch doesn't come along and
ruin a putting green in a single
night.
1t isn't stretching the truth too
far to say that the greenskeepers,
with their improved technique in
course upkeep, have enabled the
average golfer to cut a couple of
shots off his score every round.
Transformation of putting greens
into the smooth patches of velvety
turf they are today would do that
alone, without the improvement in
bunker construction, smoothing out
OF bad spots and general improve
ments in the course. Low scoring in
golf depends on two things. Loosely,
you can group them into shotmak-
Ing Skill and course condition. You
can't hole putt for a bird on a
green over which the ball jumps like
football. Nor can you play crisp
iron shots out of holes. The boys
behind the upkeep of the course have
Whitfield more strokes from the
handicap of Gus @. Golfer than Gus
himself has knocked off.
I wouldn't know and wouldn t
care how much the country clubs
around Washington spend on course
upkeep. 1t probably averages
around $4,000 or $4,000 year for
each course. In other words. the
country clubs alone, leaving out the
public links, spend around 5000 900
a year in course upkeep. They get
1t back in course condition, and part
OF the cost is absorbed by green's
fees. But they get more of it back
IN satisfaction on the part of the
membership. The golf club today
which lets the grass grow up uncut
on the face of bunkers, which never
rakes the traps and which doesn't
keep its putting green's carefully
groomed, is sure to lose some men,
bers. But the cost isn't too much
to maintain property whose total
valuation as golf courses runs we'll
into the millions.
But such men as Dick Watson at
Chevy Chase, o. B. Fits at Colum-
bia, Tom Fisher at Burning Tree,
Dave Thomson at Washington, to
mention a few, aren't satisfied to
stop when they've groomed the fifth
green to the consistency of a bill
lizard table. They want 'em all that
way, and they constantly are seeking
new approaches and new ideas for
further improvement. Backed by
the Mid-Atlantic Association of
Greenskeepers, these unsung heroes
OF golf are going back to school late
thlS month, at the University of
Maryland. where course for green's
keepers has been arranged. It's the
first time that has been done by
any college in this territory and all
the greenskeepers will be there on
January Is, 26 and q.
Sarazen Has Right Slant.
Just the other day Gene Sarazen
popped off that the courses are
playing too easy, laying to the fact
that greens are kept watered gen.
erously the improvement in scoring.
There's no question that Gene Is
right and that any one can pump
a full brassie shot to a watered
green with little fear it will bounce
over. But Gene didn't take into
account the fact that Gus Duffer
gets more kick out of sloppy shot
that gets up there and stays there
than good one that hops off into
a trap. Or that Gus Duffer pays
the bills. and that a watered
green will stand up better than one
that isn't watered. When they start
tossing orchids around for golfers
they might at least heave gardenia
in the direction of the greenskeeper.
He works long and hard and he gets
results. To him more than any
other factor, including shotmaking
technique, is due the improvement
In scoring among expert and duffer
alike.