Sunday Coffee

Dixie Whiz Kids

There is a piece of American golf history that is unknown to
most, although its main character is a god of our game.

When the US joined WW1 in 1917, the American Red Cross followed
the lead of foreign chapters and began an initiative to raise money for the war
efforts. The Red Cross found a unique way to raise funds - hosting fundraising
golf matches across the United States as a form of entertainment. Since capable men over 18 were in the throws of a World War, the history of these matches lies in their competitors.

Teenage amateur golf phenoms became actors on a grand stage, their prodigious skill sets becoming the fodder for a changing
America. Even though professionals such as Walter Hagen and America’s greatest amateur Francis Ouimet were also hosting exhibitions, the more premier showdowns were said to be among the youthful powerhouse known as the Dixie Whiz Kids.

East Lake members Bobby Jones and Alexa Sterling led the
bunch with decorated resumes. Jones fresh off a Southern Amateur title at Birmingham CC, casually dusting the field at the age of 15. Sterling was already a Women’s Amateur champ at age 20, her first of three in her career. Perry Adair and Watts Gunn from Atlanta joined Elaine Rosenthal from Chicago to round out the Dixie Whiz Kids - who used the name from their junior golf program at East Lake. 

The crew toured America coast to coast in 1917 and 1918,
enthralling galleries with their unbridled talent and enticing matches. The
Whiz Kids would go on to raise over $150,000 for the Red Cross and were
heralded for their contributions to the war funding effort.

Golf writers and fans all over the country were exposed to a
talent in Jones that would soon take the game under his wing. Its hard to imagine watching a 15 year old Bobby Jones strike irons around your local club, all the while the world is in turmoil. Perhaps the Whiz Kids provided a relief that exceeded monetary value, and instead created hope for a future unknown.

Apple Tree Gang


Hailed as the commencement of American Golf, the story of “The Gang” takes us to New York pastures in 1887.

Robert Lockhart, a Scottish immigrant and linen merchant in NY, received a large package shipped directly from the Old Course at St Andrews. Lockhart had recently journeyed back to Scotland for a visit, and while in country had met with Old Tom Morris at the Old Course for what I can only surmise to be on of the initial golf club fittings in history. The clubs and balls were chosen for Lockhart and shippedacross the pond to New York.

Now with the cherished tools in hand on American soil, Lockhart and his sons took to the West side of the city to an open field to launch some gutta percha balls. As the story goes, a policeman who was watching the trio, removed himself from his horse to have a swing. With his first rip, he launched one farther than the Lockhart clan. He followed that triumph with multiple cutsinto the thin air, missing the ball entirely. He walked away displeased, and I too know that feeling in my bones almost 150 years later. After breaking in the clubs, they were gifted to Lockhart’s friend John Reid, an exec at JL Mott Iron Works. Scouting out pastureland near his Yonkers residence, Reid gathered 5 cronies and began to lay out 3 “holes” in the open pastureland. Although crude, the framework for American golf now lay in an open Yonkers field, and 6 men dreaming of more.

Over the next year, Reid and his gang moved on to larger pastures, designing golf holes with nothing but a few clubs, creative minds, and brothers to share it with. One pasture contained vast orchards of apple trees, and all of a sudden our wayward band of nomads had a moniker – The AppleTree Gang. Over the years the Gang would grow, innovate, and form the St. Andrew’s (mind the apostrophe) Golf Club.

They would soon become a nine hole course, a clubhouse, and a bustling membership of New York’s finest, including Andrew Carnegie. All thanks to the Gang wandering pastures and dreaming, alongside their brothers.