On May 14th 1754 golf was formalised at St Andrews with the foundation of the St Andrews Society of
On May 14th 1754 golf was formalised at St Andrews with the foundation of the St Andrews Society of Golfers.To a lot of people, St Andrews is synonymous with golf. Every year tourists from around the globe come to admire the ‘Home of Golf’ and arguably the most famous 18th hole in the world. This tradition of golf can be traced back to the formalisation of the sport with the foundation of the Society of St Andrews Golfers on this day in 1754.The Royal & Ancient as it is now known was formed by 22 noblemen, professors and landowners, he Old Course originally consisted of twenty-two holes, eleven out and eleven back. On completing a hole, the player teed up his ball within two club lengths of the previous hole, using a handful of sand scooped out from the hole to form a tee.In 1764, the Society of St Andrews Golfers decided that some holes were too short and combined them. This reduced the course to eighteen holes and created what became the standard round of golf throughout the world.It could have all ended in St Andrews for golf In 1797, due to ‘temporary impecuniosity,’ that is to say bankruptcy, St Andrews Town Council lost total control of the Links, allowing rabbit farming to challenge golf for pre-eminence. Twenty years of legal and physical war between golfers and the rabbit farmers concluded in 1821 when James Cheape of Strathtyrum, a local landowner and keen golfer, bought the land and, in his own estimation, ‘saved the Links for golf.’The Open Championship was first played on the Old Course at St Andrews in 1873. With the 29th staging of the world’s premier golf event taking place again on the Old Course in 2015, it will return in 2021, St Andrews has held the event more often than anywhere else. In modern times, the Dunhill Cup and the subsequent Dunhill Links Championship have been played at St Andrews since 1985, while the Walker Cup, the Amateur Championship and a host of other professional and amateur competitions for men and women have been held over the fabled links at the Home of Golf.St Andrews now has no less than seven golf courses around the town.Much more history can be found here https://www.scottishgolfhistory.org/ -- source link
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