Evening star., 1941-08-02
Wooden Shafts Seen
Solution if Metal
Becomes Tight
Outlook for Two Years
Hence Appears Dark;
Pros Aid Asked
By WALTER McCALLUM.

anticipate their golf club needs for
1912 and lay in clubs which may
last them a few years.
Throughout the golf club manu-
featuring industry the word Is being
passed around that next year it may
become tough to get new golf clubs,
and a year later it may be impos-
sible. The golf club manufacturers
right now are runping into the same
kind of priority requisitions that are
holding up orders in all but essential
defense operations.
One manufacturer, in a letter to
the pros asks them to be patient,
and says that steel and other es-
Sentials in the manufacture of golf
clubs right now must go through
the same priority status as other
materials which are used in the
defense industries. He doesn't ad-
wise overstocking in anticipation of
the day when there won't be enough
clubs to go around. but he does ask
the pros, asks them to be patient.
OF the involved business that is the
manufacture of golf clubs.
Steel Is Big Essential.
Steel, OF course, is the big essential
in golf club manufacture nowadays,
and not a great deal of it is used
by comparison with the heavy in
dustries. But all steel comes under
priority orders nowadays, and the
time can come when there won't
be enough steel from which to make
golf clubs. When you consider that
the average wooden club steel shaft
weighs around Al ounces, and the
steel head on an iron" club weighs
around IL or IL ounces, it doesn't
seem so much. But in the aggregate,
with possibly 100000 golfers buy
ing new equipment each year, it
must amount to something.
Gene Sarazen, always looking
ahead. said weeks ago that it might
be smart for golf club manufac-
turers to stop making clubs for a
year or more. Genes observation
at the time was intended to catch
up on the slack of clubs already
manufactured, and sell them be-
fore more were made Gene didn't
anticipate the time when materials
themselves would be difficult TO
obtain, or if he did he said nothing
about it.
Of course the whole golf club
situation isn't serious when you
consider the thousands of acres of
hickory growth that could almost
instantly be transformed into good
golf clubs shafts. And the per-
simmon, fit for wooden club heads
And probably there are enough old
steel heads lying around in lockers
| and golf shops throughout the land
to f1t out all the golfers with a
complete new set of clubs, with
wooden shafts. And in passing you
could find plenty of men who'll
testify they feel much better hit
ting golf ball with wooden shaft
ed weapon as against the dull, feel
lacking steel shaft.
Industry May Lack Material.
But whatever that situation, it
doesn't do to laugh of the posi-
bility that the entire golf club in
dustry may be fumbling around a
few months from now trying to get
some of the essential metals that
go into a golf club. Not that it
will do any great harm to the pres
ent crop of linksmen and links
women who have modern sets of
matched clubs. These clubs hap
pen to be so we'll made and so ever
lasting that they'll do for a decade
and more with good care. But new
addicts come into the game every
year. If they can't find equipment
| Of the right kind it means the
sitting of what today is Americas
national participant sport, in num-
bers and any other way you want
to figure it, money spent on equip
ment, green fees or anything else.
The steel shaft. of course, is here
to stay. Wooden shafts can replace
steel and will. if it comes to a mat
ter of necessity. But steel shafts
have brought average scoring away
down, the present generation of
| golfers have become used TO steel,
and use now of wood would be a
throwback. A good one, some people
feel, but throwback nevertheless.
1t might be smart move, if you
need new set of clubs, to move out
and buy them before stocks are so
low you cannot find what you want.
Mrs. Pray Manor Winner.
Mrs. L. G. Pray, long one Of
| Washington's steadiest linkswomen,
is the new holder of the Punch
Bowl Trophy at the Manor Country
Club. Playing with a handicap of
| four strokes per round Mrs. Pray
won the 36-hole tourney yesterday,
finishing 4 down to par for the dis
tance. She wound up only one
stroke behind par yesterday with
an 81, playing the first nine at
Manor (that tough woods stretch)
in 81 strokes.
Second was Mrs. J. E. Nell Chan
dicap 12) with score 10 down to
par. Mrs. Walter r. Stokes, 1910
winner of the trophy, won the gross
award with I'll for 36 holes.
Semi -finalists in the Horton Cup
tourney for men with handicapS be-
tween II and 1S at the Washington
Golf and Country Club are: James
z. McCabe, r. w. Westwood, A. T.
Ricketts, and Lafayette Franklin, sr.
They will meet next Sunday in that
order with two to enter the final.
Second round results: J. E. Nc
Cabe defeated H. T. Bisselle, 3 and
/; r. w. Westwood defeated H E..
Radcliffe, 4 and 3; A. T. Ricketts,
defeated Paul Perkins by default;
L. Franklin, sr., defeated J..W. JOS
lin, 2 and /.
At Washington Mrs. C. A. Ohm
stead won a nine-hole tourney with
a net of So. Other winners were
Mrs. Ingram Harr (40). Mrs. G. F.
Lynch (4D and Mrs. H. D.
Smith (4D.