My dear late mother used to say that life belongs to the living, but I also think it’s useful at times to consider those who came before. This is a book about the amazing lives of people who happened to play golf. Not the “great” men and women of the game known to all, but those who reside in the shadows of our collective memory.
Most people live life without much genuine consideration for history, which they see as abstract – a subject taught in school and never to be remembered beyond one’s teenage years. But it is people. We are all a part of it, whether we know it or not, whether we like it or not. For me, my interest in history began in grade school, listening to my teacher read to us from Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House books. The vibrant pictures Wilder painted in my mind allowed me to feel the cold wind whipping snow in my face during a prairie blizzard and hear the unnerving howls of wolves in the woods.
It was at Cannon Beach, Oregon where my love of history really came to the fore, as I used to vividly imagine how it must have been for Lewis and Clark when they reached the Pacific Ocean almost two-hundred years earlier. My mom and dad had friends who owned a vacation cabin there, and I remember the anticipation of going to the beach for Memorial Day and Labor Day weekends. I remember coming over the coast range mountains on Highway 26 and seeing that majestic blue ocean stretched before us, the setting sun reflecting an orange glow off a shimmering expanse of water. It stirred the soul. This must have been what Lewis and Clark felt, I thought, as I was filled with the sincere excitement of visiting such a beautiful place in God’s creation.
Golf courses are also wonderful places, and when I’m on one that’s pleasing to me I feel at peace, as if the land knows I’m there and is watching over me. The green grass and the trees are comforting. Charles Blair Macdonald, who helped bring the game to the United States and designed the Chicago Golf Club in 1892, wrote about its pleasures:
"Wandering over the links, inhaling and enjoying the fresh air of the country, the senses are awakened, and all alert, one takes pleasure in the landscape, watching the varied shades of sunlight and shadow, which become gentle features of the game, until with sunset, happily tired, he is primed to enjoy a good dinner and a restful evening. No game gives a player’s better nature a wider scope, and herein is its charm."
Jimmie DeVoe, a great African American professional and teacher featured in this book once said that golf is a romantic game, because you can really fall in love with it: “You hit a good shot and you go home and in the middle of the night you wake up and you think about it. Golf is like a lover – you can’t get it off your mind. I guess you could call it unrequited love, because you never possess it.”
The confluence of my love of golf and history therefore motivates me. But why this book, now? In an earlier career I worked at George Washington University as an archivist in the Gelman Library. I used to tell people I was surrounded by dead people every day, since I assisted researchers using papers and documents created by people who had long since passed away. When you’re an archivist or special collections librarian you get to know the people whose work is entrusted to you.
I organized the papers of many men and women, and felt a responsibility to maintain and protect them; to be a good steward. I also found some wonderful stories that I felt should be told. My boss was able to create an online encyclopedia of the university’s history and we each wrote articles for it, making bits and pieces available to researchers. I was a believer in making collections available even if they weren’t fully processed (organized), not being content to just keep them neat and orderly and in their place. What’s the point of history if you aren’t curious about it and don’t explore it?