6 Things to Know: The Lido at Sand Valley
The Lido at Sand Valley Golf Resort is a faithful recreation of a long-gone layout once celebrated as the best in the world. The original version was built on New York’s Long Island in the early 1900s by renowned architects C.B. Macdonald and Seth Raynor but demolished by the U.S. Navy during World War II […]
The Greatest Course Never Built
Beverly Hills Country Club had it all—except an opening date The script was straight out of Hollywood. Crooked lawyers. Mob money. Politicians on the take. L.A. nightclubs. Legendary entertainers. All set against the backdrop of the Vietnam War, the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, and the toniest enclave in the City of Angels. This is […]
A Timeline of Golf’s Most Important Dates
The following timeline of notable events in golf history isn’t meant to be comprehensive, simply enlightening.
Ben Wright: Buttered and Bunkered
Of all the great golfers I have seen in more than half a century of covering the game, I believe the best never to win a major was the majestic Irishman Christy O’Connor Sr. A two-time winner of the European Tour’s Order of Merit (1961, ’62) and a member of the Great Britain and […]
Ben Wright: Sneak Preview
The 1965 Open Championship at Royal Birkdale
Tommy Aaron: I Was There—The Collapse at The 1968 Masters
The true story—and an incredible, never-before-told admission—of golf’s most famous mistake It’s been half a century since the strangest day of my playing career—the final round of the 1968 Masters—but even in my 80s I can remember every detail as if it were yesterday. What a battle. Sixteen players were within four strokes of Gary […]
I Was There for Van de Velde’s 1999 Open Championship Crash
By Dave Seanor Redemption or ignominy. That’s what hung in the balance as Jean Van de Velde stalked a six-foot putt for triple bogey at the 72nd hole of the 128th Open Championship at Carnoustie Golf Links. Van de Velde needed to hole the putt to join Justin Leonard and Paul Lawrie in a […]
The Essential: Dick Wilson
These days, many define the post-war period in golf design as the “Robert Trent Jones Era,” but it’s sometimes forgotten that for nearly 20 years he had a rival matching him course for course. Louis Sibbett “Dick” Wilson, born in Philadelphia in 1904, dropped out of the University of Vermont (which he had attended on […]
Great Courses of Britain & Ireland: St. Enodoc
Occupying the extreme westerly tip of the British Isles, with mood and scenery unlike that found in any other part of England, the county of Cornwall is more Celtic than Anglo-Saxon and, as any Cornishman will quickly tell you, it’s the region of Britain with the likeliest claim to being thehome of legendary King Arthur […]
Fifth Time’s the Charm at Shinnecock Hills
By Jeff Silverman When the latest edition of the U.S. Open rolls across the fields of Shinnecock Hills in June, canny assessors of architectural handicraft should notice a variety of amendments since the USGA last brought its carnival to town in 2004. You remember 2004: That was the year the fairways were about as […]