In concert with the rest of the nation, California was growing as well, from a population of 92,597 in 1850 to 1,311,564 by the turn of the century. One of the magic words in California's growth was railroads, which brought not only new settlers to the state but, perhaps equally important, vacationers. Transportation, real estate and vacationers fueled the growth of golf in Southern California as the 19th century was coming to a close, a triumvirate that hasn't changed in 100 years.
The great railroad war began in 1876 when the Southern Pacific line between San Francisco and Los Angeles was finished. Nine years later, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe circumvented SP's attempts to maintain a California monopoly and completed its southern U.S. route through San Bernardino and Pasadena to Los Angeles. That set off a fare war between SP and Santa Fe; tickets from the East Coast, which had cost $125 fell to as low as $95 and those low prices brought thousands of new residents and vacationers to the region -- specifically, to what we now the Inland Empire, to Pasadena and to the beach resorts of San Diego and Santa Barbara.
There are sketchy reports of golf courses in various Southern California locales from Santa Barbara to Riverside (almost all of them resort areas or areas where colonies of English settlers grew up), but these were probably only a few holes each and cannot really qualify as courses. As Ralph W. Miller noted in his "History of Golf in Southern California" (which was printed in the first issue of FORE Magazine), there's a good reason no formal history of these early efforts is recorded. The idea wrote Miller, "of several persons hitting golf balls around a pasture would have no more interest than would a quiet game of croquet on the front lawn." That would shortly change.
Riverside
It is to Redlands and Riverside that we look for the first formal golf courses in Southern California. Riverside was riding the crest of the agricultural wave that came from the introduction of oranges to the area. The first orange trees were planted in 1871 and a decade later there were more than half a million citrus trees in California, almost half of which were in Riverside. The navel orange was introduced to the United States in Riverside and, notes the city's web site, the development of refrigerated rail cars and innovative irrigation system made Riverside the wealthiest city per capita by 1895.
Considering that European settlers from the East Coast were instrumental in founding the city, it's no surprise that golf began to appear on the scene early on The Riverside Daily Press reported in 1891 that a group of people, including Charles E. Maud, laid out a four- or five-hole course near an area known as the "Orange Camp." No one knows for sure if that course actually existed, but Maud would later become the first president of the Southern California Golf Association.
More importantly, Joan Hall, in her history of The Victoria Club, relates that in January, 1893, eight men gathered in the meeting of a downtown hotel rented by the Riverside Country Club, where they listened to Henry Lockwood, a member who had recently played St. Andrews (NY). Subsequently, a nine-hole course was built on land near what is now the University of California at Riverside. Although nobody knows exactly where the course was and there is some dispute, this course -- known variously as Buena Vista, Box Springs and Riverside Golf Club -- may well have been the first golf course in Southern California.
And what a course it was -- about twice as long as 18-hole courses that were built later. The first hole, recounts Miller, was more than 600 yards long. "On one occasion, W.J. McIntyre took 37 strokes at his ball in a small bush 'without once losing his good form or uttering a profane word.'" Perhaps not surprisingly, the course was abandoned in 1896.
Another club was formed in 1893, called the Riverside Polo Club (again, with Maud as one of the founders). Three years later, golf was added to the agenda and the name was changed to the Riverside Polo & Golf Club. The severity of the course might be noted from the hole names: The Goal, The Grave, The Styx, Sudden Death, Hades and The Devil's Own. When the club moved to a new location in 1900, golf was abandoned and the club's golfing members were absorbed by the Pachappa Golf Club or the Rubidoux Golf Club.
Pachappa was a nine-hole course formed in 1898 and located about two miles from the center of town. Rubideaux was also a nine-hole course formed in April, 1899. Much of Riverside's elite were members or these three clubs, including men such as Philip Pedley and Robert Osburn who would be instrumental in founding the SCGA and, in 1903, The Victoria Club.
Redlands
Like Riverside, Redlands was enjoying a boom due to its prominence as an agricultural site and a tourist mecca. In "Redlands Country Club: A Centennial History," author Larry Burgess noted that "Redlands in 1897 enjoyed an enviable reputation as a Ômust see destination' for tourists from all across America who marveled at the private Stanley Heights botanical park, the beautiful mansions, the striking valley with its navel orange groves framed by the San Bernardino Mountains as the backdrop, and the badlands hills of San Timoteo Canyon to the south."
On November 21, 1896, 30 men met at the Casa Loma Hotel to create what would become the Redlands Country Club. The founders -- who had come to Redlands from New England, New York, Chicago and Scotland -- moved quickly and by the next year had leased land, built a course and constructed a clubhouse. The nine-hole course was 2,129 yards in length and today's course sits on that original land, making it the oldest club in Southern California -- and, indeed, one of the oldest courses in the United States -- still on its existing site.
Not everyone was thrilled with the course. Thomas H. Arnold, in his article "Golfing in the Far West," notes that "The course is not easy of access, and the lay of the ground, along the foot-hills is quite undesirable for golfing. Besides this, the course is badly laid out and is sadly in need of remodeling." Arnold was far more taken with the course at the Casa Loma Hotel in Redlands.
But RCC members were undaunted. The club was instrumental in the founding and early years of the SCGA, George Lawson became the club's first professional in 1901, and one of its members, Katherine Harley, became the first SCGA club member to win a national championship when she captured the U.S. Women's Amateur in 1908.
Pasadena
Largely due to its luxury hotels, golf thrived in Pasadena from the 1890s. In 1894, E.H. Strafford, an Englishman who loved golf, carved out a few holes on the massive Campbell-Johnston Ranch, a property of 2,214 acres that now includes such landmarks as the Rose Bowl and Annandale Golf Club. Walter Grindlay, an Englishman visiting the Southland, described it in "Golf," an English magazine in its issue of July 15, 1898: "There was a private course on a ranch, but it was overgrown with ÔTurkey-weed' and the manager was waiting for the frost to kill the week and rain to bring up the grass."
Conway Campbell-Johnston, owner of the ranch on which that course was situated, was one of the founders of Pasadena Country Club on July 7, 1897 and Strafford was one of the first members. The course was laid out in a tract known as Oak Grove in what is now San Marino and was frequented by guests at the Hotel Green and Raymond Hotel (see separate story).
The first caddie strike in Southern California occurred at the Pasadena CC in July, 1898. The caddies demanded higher pay, and the Los Angeles Times reported, " . . . they claim that 15 cents a round is too little money to run all over a twenty-acre lot chasing golf balls and carrying the sticks. The price paid in Oakland is 10 cents a round, and the links are longer, but that makes no difference to the Pasadena youth, who is to heathy -- or to proud -- to work for anything less than what his conferees in other cities get."
Many of the club's members joined Annandale Golf Club when it was built in 1906, and when the Midwick Country Club was founded in 1912, it sounded the death knell for PCC and eventually the club closed. But before that, it had played an instrumental role in founding and shaping the SCGA, and a club member, John B. Miller became the second SCGA president in 1900.
Santa Monica
As it is today, the "west side" -- then called Santa Monica-by-the-Bay -- was awash in the social scene and in August, 1897, the Santa Monica Golf Club came into being. In many respects, this was as close to a true links-style course as you could get and Grindlay, in his July 15, 1898 article in "Golf," wrote:
The Santa Monica links are simple and unique, and furnish monumental evidence of the fascination of the game even when stripped of all the usual accessories. The links consist of a perfectly flat plain of hard beaten mud, plentifully strewn with cones and shreds of bark from the surrounding Eucalyptus trees, but without a single blade of grass or any hazard except a couple of overturned benches with wire-netting attached."
The charms of this layout notwithstanding, two other courses were laid out in Santa Monica including one that was bisected by the Santa Fe Railroad which, as a Los Angeles Times article noted out, "forms a difficult bunker for several of the drives." There's no truth to the rumor, however, that Pete Dye's grandfather designed the course. The article also noted that "there were many complaints that the trains exceeded the speed limit of 8 miles per hour for trains."
Grindlay was an ardent golfer, although he was partially paralyzed on his left side. According to Links With the Past: The First 100 Years of The Los Angeles Country Club, "Grindlay was the best golfer in the area, playing what amounted to scratch golf with an iron club attached to his right arm with a barrel stave." He was also instrumental in the formation of The Los Angeles CC.
Los Angeles
With a population of 85,000 in 1897, it seems strange that Los Angeles had not yet been bitten by the golfing but that was about to change. One of those with whom Grindlay often played was a Santa Monica sporting goods merchant and tennis enthusiast named Edward B. Tufts and, after Grindlay threatened to leave Southern California if a better course wasn't built, Grindlay, Tufts and two of Grindlay's pupils, Hugh W. Vail and E. Conde Jones, organized a voluntary organization, The Los Angeles Golf Club, in December, 1897.
The four men leased a 16-acre parcel at the corner of Pico and Alvarado which had the dual advantage of being close to two trolley lines and also to the fashionable West Adams district, where many well-to-do people resided. In a mere five days, a nine-hole, 1,913-yard course was laid out and built, with the four men using picks, shovels and rakes to clear debris and construct the holes.
The course became known as "The Windmill Links" because of a burned-out windmill, 12 feet by 16 feet at its base, which served as the club's first clubhouse. Like all virtually all courses at the time, the greens were made of oiled sand (they were often called "skins" which may account for the name of the popular game) and each was 22 1/2 feet in diameter. "With Grindlay supervising," writes Robert Windeler in The Los Angeles CC's centennial book, "Tufts and Jones reamed out the holes with butcher knives and sank newly emptied tomato cans, six inches across by six inches high, as cups in the exact center of each green."
Grindlay would later written in "Golf": The ground was as hard as the best macadam, very rough and covered with short, wiry, dried-up and altogether un-putt-over-able burr clover. In a country where it rains in a deluge three or four times a year and not at all the rest of the time, turf greens were obviously impossible. . . " (Grindlay had obviously not been to the Coronado Golf Club in San Diego, which apparently did have turf greens).
In addition to the founding quartet, the club's organizers included Joseph F. Sartori, who was president of the Security Savings Bank. He wrote to friends, urging them to join, noting, "We need shovels and things to fix up the greens, so we're obliged to charge you $5.00 to enter our club." Women were offered memberships in the club "with full privileges" for just $2.50.
The club grew rapidly. Harry Grindlay, Walter's brother, became the club's first full-time employee -- "trainer and groundskeeper" -- for a salary of $5 per day and later defeated W.H. Way (known as Bertie of Willie) of the Pasadena Country Club in Southern California's first professional golf match that winter.
But the popularity of the club and of the game itself soon made the "Windmill Links" overcrowded and Tufts and Sartori found land 1 1/2 miles farther west on Pico behind a brick convent in an area knows as "Pico Heights." On September 9, 1898, "The Convent Links" -- slightly longer (2,008 yards) and much more difficult (adding as many as 20 strokes to players scores for 18 holes) -- opened for play. A month later, the club incorporated as The Los Angeles Country Club.
But even this new facility could not keep up with the popularity and so, once again, Sartori and Tufts went in search of new property, further west. They didn't have to journey far. On the corner of what is now Pico and Western Ave., they found a tract of land on which the club could build an 18-hole course. When it was finished in Sept., 1899, The Los Angeles CC had either the first or second 18-hole course west of Chicago (depending on which article you read).
The growth pattern continued and by 1908, LACC had 508 members. So, for the third and final time, the club moved west, this time to its present Wilshire Boulevard location in Beverly Hills. There they constructed a 6,496-yard course that would eventually be replaced by the current layout, designed by George Thomas more than a decade later.
It may have taken many years for golf to take hold in Southern California, but once established the game grew rapidly in popularity. Not everyone was pleased with this new sport. When the Rev. E.F. Goff, pastor of the First Congregational Church of Riverside, spoke to a large audience at the opera house on "Amusement and Recreation," he took the occasion to denounce the playing of golf and billiards on Sundays, expressing the hope that "Christian sentiment would pronounce itself so strongly that the click of golf and billiard balls will never again be heard in Riverside on Sunday."
But the good pastor was in a minority. As more clubs were being formed and more tournaments and events held each month, it became apparent that some sort of umbrella organization need to be founded to adjudicate disputes and maintain some semblance of overall order and consistency in the increasingly popular sport.
On July 29, 1899, representatives from five clubs -Los Angeles, Pasadena, Redlands, Riverside Polo & Golf and Santa Monica -- met in Joseph Sartori's office at Security Bank in downtown Los Angeles and drafted a constitution and bylaws drafted by Sartori, who had obviously read the USGA bylaws and adopted similar wording.
"The object of this association," says Article II of the SCGA constitution, "shall be to promote interest in the game of golf; the protection of the mutual interest of its members; to establish and enforce uniformity in the rules of the game by creating a representative authority, its executive committee, to be a Court of Reference as a final authority in matters of controversy; to establish a uniform system of handicapping; to decide on what links the amateur, open and ladies' championships of Southern California, and such other championships, as may be decided upon by the executive committee, shall be played."
Charles E. Maud of Riverside was elected the first president of the SCGA and J.B. Miller of Pasadena was elected vice-president. Sartori was named secretary, while Tufts and R.D. Osborne (another member of Riverside Polo and Golf Club) were elected to the executive committee. At a subsequent meeting, Tufts was chosen as the association's "official handicapper," a task he would continue until his death.
Historical Note: Grand Hotel, Of Course
From its inception, the SCGA set in motion a series of actions that would have far-reaching consequences.
One of those was the SCGA Amateur Championship, which was first conducted February 21-23, 1900, at the "Convent Links" of The Los Angeles Country Club. After a rain delay, 29 golfers began the event Charles E. Orr of Pasadena CC defeated Charles E. Maud of Riverside, 6 & 4, in the championship match (see separate listings for other winners). It was the first of what would be 99 consecutive years in which this event has been held; only the Utah State Amateur (which began in 1899) has a longer unbroken string of championships.
The first 20 years were also notable for two multiple winners. Walter Fairbanks became the first three-time winner when he captured the 1901, 1903 and 1905 SCGA Amateur, a feat which was matched by Paul Hunter (see separate story) who became the first back-to-back winner in 1908-09. Hunter would win three more titles in the 1920s, making him the only five-time champion in the event's history.
While the SCGA Amateur has been held every year, the Southern California Open and the Ladies championship were held more sporadically. The Open was held for 10 years and then appeared off and on, while the women's amateur was often not held each year, although various clubs continue to hold major women's tournaments.
The second move was to solidify the Team Match program which had been held informally between clubs for several years previous to the SCGA's inception. On Jan. 27-27, Los Angeles, Riverside, Pasadena and Catalina met in the first SCGA Team Matches (Redlands was supposed to play but newspaper accounts don't indicate that it did). In the four-man team competition, Los Angeles won with 19 team points; Pasadena was second with 15.
Why Catalina? The answer lies in the third -- and perhaps most important -- decision taken by the newly formed association.
With the number of hotel-type golf facilities equalling or exceeding the number of what today would be called private clubs, the SCGA created two types of membership categories: "associate," which was for golf clubs, and "allied," which was for hotel courses. In doing so, the association's founders put the association on record as being interested in the clubs that served both the public and private sectors.
Thus, on November 3, 1899, Coronado Golf Club and Hemet Golf Club (a.k.a. as the Cactus Golf Club) -- both of which were affiliated with hotels (the Hotel del Coronado and the Hemet Hotel) -- became the sixth and seventh clubs admitted to SCGA membership, followed a month later by four others: Santa Catalina, Hotel Green and Rubideaux, all of which were admitted as allied members) and Pachappa GC in Riverside, which was an associate member.
Historical Note: The SCGA Amateur Championship
Golf courses were springing up throughout Southern California, some of which lasted only a few years and others of which exists today.
San Diego
Considering that San Diego is now one of this country's thriving golf meccas, its beginnings were anything but robust. The city's first course (which would eventually become the home of the San Diego Country Club) was built on part of what is now Balboa Park in 1897, a nine-hole course with dirt fairways and sand greens. It stayed at that location until 1913 when city fathers evicted it to make way for the 1915 Panama-California Exposition.
Meanwhile across the bay in Coronado, a nine-hole course was constructed before the turn of the century and in 1901, a more luxurious, 18-hole facility was built to be used by members and guests of the Hotel del Coronado (see Grand Hotel, Of Course).
In 1912, A.G. Spalding (founder of Spalding Sporting Goods) built the Pt. Loma Golf Club on the bluffs overlooking San Diego Bay. That course became home to the San Diego Country Club until 1921 when it moved to its present location in Chula Vista.
Meanwhile, after the Panama-California Exposition, the Balboa Park Municipal Golf Course was constructed, with 18 holes again consisting of dirt fairways and sand greens, located approximately in the same place where it exists today. It took until 1931 for the fairways and greens to be seeded with grass.
Orange County
On December 7, 1899 (a date which doesn't live in infamy), a group gathered at the Sunset Club in Santa Ana for the purpose of organizing the Santiago Golf Club and introducing "the health-giving and pleasure-giving game of golf," to quote an article from the Santa Ana Blade. They leased land from James Irvine near Peters Canyon and with hoes, shovels and rakes hacked out a nine-hole course. The club later became Orange County Country Club before evolving into Santa Ana Country Club.
George Shattuck, who later would become president of Santa Ana CC, recalls, "It was a nine-hole course, picturesque, too, but too far from town. In those days most everybody traveled by horse and buggy and the old-timers soon got tired of the long hauls."
San Gabriel Valley
Not everyone traveled by horse and buggy. Railroads and the rapidly expanding light-rail (or trolley) systems being laid down by Henry Huntington and others were magnets for two new courses in the San Gabriel Valley: Annandale Golf Club and San Gabriel (Valley) CC.
Huntington (nephew of railroad magnate Collis P. Huntington) began his rise to prominence by acquiring the Los Angeles Railway Company in 1898. Three years later, the Pacific Electric Railway Company was begun and would eventually lay down thousands of miles of light-rail tracks throughout Southern California. The Pacific Electric's expansion opened up the Arroyo Seco area and in 1905, a Los Angeles Times story, headlined "Golf Club of Millionaires," announced that Huntington had purchased 320 acres of the Campbell-Johnston Ranch in what was known as San Rafael Heights to build the area's first major golf course subdivision.
The nickname "millionaires golf club" was no joke. The plans included spending $10,000 on the course and an equal amount on a clubhouse, plus an additional $25,000 on the infrastructure, which included transportation by the Pacific Electric Short Line Railroad between Los Angeles, Pasadena and Mount Lowe. Many of the members were coming from the Pasadena Country Club because, as Annandale's 75th anniversary book notes, "they were interested in developing a club that would be primarily devoted to the game of golf, rather than to social activities."
When Annandale was completed in 1907, it was one of the first 18-hole courses in Southern California and one of the longest, at 6,105 yards. The designers included William Watson, a well-known Scottish golf course architect and creator of The Olympic Club in San Francisco, and C.E. Orr, the first SCGA Amateur champion.
San Gabriel Country Club also owes its existence, in part, to the Pacific Electric Railway for the "Big Red Cars" ran virtually to the club's entrance. In 1904, the club (which was then called San Gabriel Valley Country Club) built a nine-hole course, designed by Norman Macbeth, on land that had originally been part of the San Gabriel Mission (Mission Bells are a familiar trademark at the club). Nine years later, Macbeth added another nine holes as were many of the great oak trees that line the course today.
And, finally, there was Midwick Country Club, located on the border of what is now Alhambra and Monterey Park. From its inception in 1912, Midwick was considered to be a championship course -- no surprise, since it was designed by Macbeth, who was one of the SCGA's premiere golfers. Midwick (pronounced Middick) hosted the SCGA Amateur in 1915 (when it was one by a club member, E.S. Armstrong), hosted the tournament again in 1917, and then hosted it three times in an eight-year period, beginning in 1923.
Santa Barbara
Although the Santa Barbara Country Club was reportedly organized in 1894, what golf there was consisted of three or four holes near the Biltmore Hotel. After several aborted attempts, hotelman Milo Potter constructed a nine-hole course in 1909 which was primarily for hotel guests. The original Santa Barbara Country Club eventually moved to its present location and was renamed Montecito Country Club in 1913.
The Potter CC failed after only a few years and eventually another club, known as Hope Ranch CC and then as La Cumbre CC, was organized in 1914. It would be several years later before its course would be constructed.
The impending onset of World War I led to a slowdown in golf course construction during the latter part of the second decade of the 20th century. Part of that downturn was, no doubt, due also to the fact that vacation travel was curtailed during hostilities.
However, on the horizon was the founding of Wilshire Country Club and the 1920s, which would become a "golden age" for both golf course construction and for great amateur players in the region as well.
In the January/February issue: Two great golf course architects -- George Thomas (Los Angeles, Bel Air, Riviera, Ojai Valley Inn and Palos Verdes) and Max Behr (Hacienda, Lakeside, Oakmont, Rancho Santa Fe) -- make their marks in Southern California. It's indeed a golden age -- until the Great Depression strikes. It's also an era where many of the nation's greatest amateur golfers, including George Von Elm, Charley Seaver and Roger Kelly, came from Southern California. Finally, Hollywood discovers the joys of golf during the 1930's.
From darkness to light, from bitter cold to blazing warmth, from depth to height. Whatever metaphor you choose, America in 1920 had emerged from four long cruel war years to the threshold of a dazzling new era, one that was marked by peace and prosperity and tempered by prohibition. It seemed as if it would last forever, but finally, an era characterized by flappers and the Charleston would evaporate into the worst of times: the Great Depression and World War II.
A confluence of events fueled the amazing decade that would become known as "The Roaring Twenties."
The great immigration wave of the last half of the 19th century, which had seen the United States population more than triple between 1850 and 1900, continued unabated as another 30 million people streamed onto America's shores in the first two decades of the 20th century.
California's growth was even more astounding. From just under 1.5 million people at the turn of the century, the state's population more than doubled to more than 3.4 million by 1920. Another 2.2 million would become California residents in the next 10 years.
Perhaps nothing so characterized America in the Roaring Twenties as its love affair with sports. Whether it was the victory aspect that satisfied America's pent-up need for winning or the outdoor element that appealed to an increasingly urbanized society, sports became deeply embedded into the American psyche during the 1920s. Babe Ruth, Jack Dempsey, Notre Dame's Four Horsemen and a golfer named Jones all captured the imagination of the American public.
Even before Bobby Jones burst onto the scene in the 1920s, an amateur golfer named Francis Ouimet had captured the fancy of Americans by winning the 1913 U.S. Open, defeating famed British pros Harry Vardon and Ted Ray in a playoff at The Country Club in Brookline, Mass. Ouimet's victory gave golf a prominence with the American public that it has never lost.
It's also worth noting that the popularity of sports in general -- and golf in particular -- is due in large measure to the millions of prosaic words penned by such newspaper reporters such as Grantland Rice, Herbert Warren Wind, Dan Jenkins and Jim Murray. As Murray once noted: "Sportswriters may owe a lot to athletes but athletes owe everything to sportswriters."
From automobiles to sporting events, from John D. Rockefeller to Bobby Jones, the 20s proved to be a golden age, one that seemingly would never end... until "Black Monday" -- October 29, 1929 -- brought it all to a crashing halt.
The golf tide in Southern California has always ebbed and flowed due, in large measure, to the region's financial fortunes, but the 1920s stand out as the first "Golden Age" of golf course architecture and construction in Southern California.
The sport of golf had captured the country and nowhere was that more evident than in Southern California. From 18 clubs with 1,371 members in 1919, the SCGA skyrocketed to 45 clubs in 1925 with approximately 20,000 members. Not all of these clubs survived the Great Depression of the 1930s or the wrecking ball as developers sought land on which to build more homes and business in succeeding decades. Nonetheless, many of the clubs built in the 1920s remain today as landmarks in golf course design.
To solve that problem, Tufts and his club, The Los Angeles Country Club, planted a patch of bermudagrass. "Almost over night (sic)," writes Tufts, "it made a smooth carpet of lawn. We then cut off the water supply and the grass turned brown and seemed to die. Even so it still presented a stiff brush that made a poor lie next to impossible. After it had apparently been killed we started watering it again and it came to life, turned green and started growing . . . Here was a grass that could not only exist but would thrive in California."
Another element of nature that contributed to the '20s golf course building boom was oil. Hundreds of people became rich when they struck oil in Southern California, from Bakersfield and the San Joaquin Valley to Santa Fe Springs, Signal Hill and Long Beach. One of the most notable of these was Alphonso Bell, whose oil riches would eventually be translated into Hacienda Golf Club and Bel-Air Country Club.
A third element that contributed to the proliferation of golf courses was real estate development. Developers looked at the success of The Los Angeles CC and Annandale Golf Club early in the century and realized that golf courses could act as a value enhancement to real estate prices. Moreover, hotel magnates saw how golf courses had significantly enhanced the renown of many resorts and hastened to either build or attach themselves to new golf courses.
Wilshire Country Club was a precursor of things to come when it was built in 1920. First, it was a course that brought additional prestige and value to its locale, Hancock Park, an area that was already one of the wealthier enclaves of Los Angeles. Moreover, its designer was Norman Macbeth, whose fame as a golfer (he was SCGA Amateur champion in 1911 and 1913) was widespread throughout the region and, indeed, the country. Thus, Macbeth might be said to be the forerunner of Jack Nicklaus and others whose golfing ability gave instant stature to their work as golf course architects.
Perhaps the most prominent was Alister MacKenzie, the Scottish-born architect who worked with well-known Southern California golfer Robert Hunter to design Cypress Point Golf Club and The Valley Club of Montecito, both in 1928. MacKenzie is also credited with designing Tijuana CC and with redesigning Redlands CC, one of the SCGA's five founding clubs.
One other person who would go on to become a respected golf course architect was William Park Bell, who came to California at 1911 and became caddie master at Annandale Golf Club.
Billy Bell served a storied apprenticeship. He was construction supervisor for Willie Watson (who designed, among others, The Olympic Club in San Francisco), and George Thomas, Jr. and is credited with making significant contributions to many of Thomas' designs (see pages 4-5).
In succeeding years, Bell designed and remodeled nearly 100 courses, some in conjunction with his son, William Francis Bell. Among Bell's finest works from the 1920s are the two courses at Brookside Golf Club in Pasadena, which date from 1928, and San Diego CC, which was built when the club relocated to its present Chula Vista location in 1921.
As was the case with golf courses, the quality of players in Southern California was also increasing rapidly. Many fine golfers continued to winter in Southern California and play in the Southern California Amateur and the California Amateur.
One was H. Chandler Egan, who had won the 1904 and 1905 U.S. Amateurs, captured the 1926 California Amateur and donated the trophy on which medalists' names are inscribed today.
Another was Willie Hunter, the 1921 British Amateur champion (and 1922 runner-up) who arrived at Midwick CC by train on the morning of qualifying for the 1923 SCGA Amateur and went on to defeat home-course hopeful E. S. Armstrong, 2 & 1, to capture the crown.
But more and more, Southern California golfers were being home grown. Some -- like George Von Elm -- migrated here from colder climes. Others -- such as Charles Seaver -- grew up in the area and then went off to college. A few, such as Von Elm and Pat Abbott went on to professional careers, but many elected to remain amateurs and competed for decades in local events.
During the SCGA's first 20 years, tournaments were dominated by what we now call mid-amateur golfers (age 25 and older). In fact, it wasn't until 1922 that the SCGA Amateur was won by a "youngster" (Von Elm).
Increasingly, Southern Californians were making their presences felt on the national scene, as well, none more so than Von Elm, who shocked the golfing world when he defeated Bobby Jones, 2 & 1, to win the 1926 U.S. Amateur at Baltusrol GC in New Jersey. It was Jones' only U.S. Amateur loss in five years.
Perhaps the most stunning example of the emergence of California golfers was in the 1937 U.S. Amateur Public Links Championship, which was held at Harding Park GC in San Francisco. Half of the 64-man field was from California and the finals was all-SCGA as Bruce McCormick edged Don Erickson, 1 up, in their 36-hole match.
Historical Note: The Many Faces of Max Behr
With more and more attention being paid to the West Coast, it was, perhaps, inevitable that professional golf would begin to make its mark in Southern California. As was the case with many things during the first quarter century of the SCGA's existence, it was Edward B. Tufts and The Los Angeles CC that led the way.
With the help of people such as Norman Macbeth, well-known magazine editor Scotty Chisholm and Jack Malley (president of the Southern California Professional Golfers Association), Tufts encouraged the Los Angeles Junior Chamber of Commerce to start up the Los Angeles Open and offer a record purse of $10,000 ($3,500 to the winner). William Randolph Hearst sent his star reporter, Damon Runyon, to cover the event, which was won by "Lighthorse" Harry Cooper at LACC's increasingly famous North Course.
The tournament's success (it remains as the nation's oldest civic-sponsored event) encouraged other tour stops, as well, although the concept of the tour as we know it today was barely in its infancy. In 1929, the Caliente Open was held in San Diego and its $25,000 purse became the largest offered.
The year 1929 was a "major" year for California. The U.S. Amateur was held that year at Pebble Beach, the first USGA championship to be west of the Rocky Mountains. The Professional Golfers Association of America (PGA) brought its championship to Hillcrest CC in Los Angeles in 1929. It wasn't considered a "major" at the time (the concept of "majors" wasn't solidified until 1930 when Bobby Jones won the U.S. Open, U.S. Amateur, British Open and British Amateur -- the so-called "Grand Slam"), but it was the first national championship to be held in Southern California. The following year, The Los Angeles Country Club hosted the U.S. Women's Amateur Championship.
In 1937, Bing Crosby, who three years before had moved to the exclusive San Diego County enclave of Rancho Santa Fe, invited a few golf professionals and friends from Hollywood to join him for a two-day tournament at the conclusion of the Del Mar racing season (where Crosby was a regular). Crosby called his tournament the "clambake" and after World War II moved it to the Monterey Peninsula where it became famous as the Bing Crosby Pro-Am (it's now called the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am).
Historical Note: Hollywood and Golf
As the SCGA grew in size, it continued to emphasize its traditional programs. The SCGA Amateur Championship was held every year with new courses being added to the rota (see pages 14 & 15). As the tournament grew in popularity, a President Flight was added for net competition in 1934 and a Vice-President Flight came a year later.
Team Play continued to grow in popularity and in 1927 SCGA Director Peter Cooper Bryce donated a trophy that is still used today. Ed Tufts continued his duties as official handicapper, as well as president.
Perhaps the most shattering event for the SCGA was the death of Tufts in 1927. He had served as SCGA president for 28 years until, as an official resolution stated, "death made its unanswerable call upon Edward B. Tufts." But two years later, an even greater shock would hit the SCGA -- and the world -- when the Great Depression struck.
Despite the Depression, the association moved forward into new areas. In 1923, a women's auxiliary had been founded at Hollywood Country Club; 10 years later it spun off to become the Women's Southern California Golf Association.
As the number of public course began to grow in the 1930s (at the beginning of that decade, more than 80% of courses in the U.S. were private and only 700 -- 1.5% -- were considered public), the SCGA encouraged the formation of what is now called the Public Links Golf Association of Southern California. In 1934, the SCGA formed the Seniors Golf Association of Southern California.
In 1930, the SCGA began a turf research program in conjunction with the University of California at Los Angeles. Over the years, the SCGA has supported many such projects, including its current involvement with the Southern California Turf Research Council and turf management and research programs at UC Riverside.
The SCGA also began experimenting, hoping to establish a more uniform system of handicapping. One proposal, by golf course architect Max Behr, was to determine handicaps based on the number of pars made. Over the years, the SCGA evaluated several alternatives before dovetailing its programs with the USGA Handicap System.
In 1934, the minutes reflect that the SCGA established its first office "at a nominal cost" at the Detweiler Building in downtown Los Angeles. The office recognized the growing importance of the SCGA and the necessity to have a central clearing house for things such as record keeping and legislative action. The SCGA's first employee was hired a few years later.
During the 1930s, the SCGA was instrumental in encouraging state government to adopt a new series of water rates which recognized that water for irrigation should be priced at a lower rate. That same year, the association led a drive to defeat in committee a state legislature bill that would have imposed a penal excise tax on income at golf clubs. It would be the first of many such efforts over the years as, periodically, state and local governments sought to tax golf courses on their supposed commercial value rather than their "actual use" basis.
Few days in American history have been as wrenching as October 29, 1929. Almost overnight, the American juggernaut came to a crash and for the next decade, the Great Depression gripped the land; as NBC News anchor Tom Brokaw put it, "Economic despair was on the land like a plague."
Like virtually all of America, the depression caused severe hardships in Southern California and, without exception, golf clubs were not exempt. Although SCGA dues were just 10 cents per member, many clubs dropped out of the association, only to reappear on the rolls again when they were able to make good on their dues payments. The saga of many clubs well-known today was painfully chronicled in sometimes month-by-month "Perils of Pauline" style struggles over non-payment of dues. The number of SCGA member clubs, which had been 56 in 1930, dipped to 31 in 1938, but rebounded to 33 in 1939.
Even more significantly, many clubs -- including some which were well-established and highly respected -- closed their doors for good during the depression or the war years that followed, including Hollywood CC and Flintridge CC.
Perhaps the most notable was Midwick CC which hosted five SCGA Amateur championships in its first 15 years of existence. In fact, during the SCGA Amateur's first half-century, only The Los Angeles CC hosted more championships than Midwick. Former SCGA Amateur and California Amateur champion Charles Seaver remembers Midwick: "The reason it died wasn't really the Depression. Instead, it was that the club stopped reaching out for new members and eventually the membership just started dying off until it was too late." The club was eventually sold at auction in 1943 and re-opened as a public course, only to fall victim to encroaching development in the 1950s.
Virtually all other clubs struggled during the depression. Most developed creative ways of attracting new members or simply opened their doors to the public on a limited basis (a practice which the SCGA board tried to discourage). Several installed slot machines to augment income.
In many cases, however, it was one or two people per club who paid the bills and enabled the club to hang on. At Red Hill CC, for example, member Newt Trautman secured a $30,000 loan that forestalled a potential sale of the club when it defaulted on a note. When Oakmont Country Club went on the auction block in 1934, William Crenshaw bought the club for $42,000 to save it for its members. At Bel-Air CC, one member, Les Kelly, advanced $5,000 to pay Bel-Air's tax bill in 1944, and another member, John M. "Jack" Longan paid employees' salaries out of his own pocket from 1935-37. Longan typified the spirit of members who bailed out their clubs during the Depression: "The sun," he said, "will shine tomorrow.
Historical Note: SCGA Amateur Championship (1920-1939)
Longan was right, but it would take a decade before his prediction would come true. First would come the six horrific years of World War II, beginning with Nazi Germany's invasion of Poland, continuing with the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941 and concluding only after millions of people were killed before the war's end in 1945.
However, with the end of World War II came an unprecedented period of prosperity: the "baby boomer" generation. It would also be an unparalleled period of golf course construction and another glorious era for Southern California amateur golfers.
For most of the United States -- and, indeed, the world -- the year 1940 was a dark moment in history. After more than a decade of the Great Depression, the nation was only just emerging into a more hopeful future.
Around the world, things continued to look bleak. Just months after invading Poland, Germany overwhelmed many small European countries and then marched into Paris, forcing France under the jackboot. The Japanese were making ominous noises in the Orient, although most Americans paid little attention to that nation's military buildup.
America itself was, at best, sharply divided over the conflict in Europe. The horrors of war were still in the minds of many who had fought in the so-called "War to End All Wars" or those who had lost loved ones in Europe. So fragmented was the nation that the "Lend Lease" bill in 1941 to send war material to England in exchange for leases on military bases passed the Congress by a single vote. Not until December 7, 1941 -- a date which President Franklin Delano Roosevelt said the following day "would live in infamy" -- would Americans full embrace the crusade that would become World War II.
Southern California struggled through the depression years but the outlook here in 1940 was more positive. The burgeoning military-industrial complex (a phrase that would be made famous by President Dwight D. Eisenhower nearly two decades later), the area's rich agricultural bounty, the motion picture and entertainment industry and the long-held belief that California was a "Shangri-La" became a magnet for millions of people from across the nation and around the world.
While the nation's population grew just 7.28 percent in the decade from 1930 to 1940, California's population grew what seemed like an astounding 21.6 percent. The city of Los Angeles' population alone grew 20.9 percent during the decade, to 1,496,792. But that was but a foreshadowing of things to come.
The other seminal shift in Californians' lifestyle was the emergence of the automobile. Unlike eastern metropolises, which were building higher and higher buildings, Californians were spreading out. A 40-mile trip, which back east would have been considered an all-day affair preceded by much planning, became just a quick jaunt for Southern Californians.
The Los Angeles Times caught the fever. When the Arroyo Seco Parkway (now called the Pasadena Freeway), the region's first freeway, opened on Dec. 30, 1940, the paper heralded the event with a front-page banner headline.
Car-happy Southern Californians quickly discovered that they didn't need to live close to their work or their recreational pursuits. Automobiles and cheap gasoline meant that a person could drive anywhere to shop or play golf. That mobility would have a profound influence on golf course, real estate and business construction during the next two decades.
It didn't happen immediately, however. While the game of golf also emerged from dark times to unparalleled growth, during these two decades, clubs continued to struggle and close during the early part of the 1940s -- to the point where by 1943 the SCGA had just 23 member clubs. Many other clubs would have closed but for the actions of handfuls of club members who rallied to keep them alive. Invariably, those clubs that did survive were those where the club was more than just a place to play golf; instead, it was a family, a fellowship, that had to be preserved at all costs.
The year 1943 proved to be the nadir. Despite the dwindling numbers, men like Lakeside Golf Club's Maurie Luxford, San Gabriel CC's Texas Schramm, Virginia CC's John Clock and many others spent hundreds of hours annually insuring the strength of the SCGA's programs and activities. Clock, who was SCGA president in 1946, also served on the USGA executive committee from 1951-59 and was elected USGA President in 1960-61, the only Southern Californian to serve in that position.
By 1945, SCGA President Charles Lathrop would note, "The war brought a great increase in the number of golfers permanent residing in the area we serve; so much so, that most of our clubs in the metropolitan area have full rosters and waiting lists in some instances... There is a great need for more golf courses, both public and private and a scarcity of acreage of suitable character both in respect to cost and location within reasonable distances."
However, the recovery didn't happen without several tragedies which rocked the Southern California golf community.
In February, 1942, Madison Finlay, a member at Redlands CC, received a phone call. "Early one morning, Majorie Helm called to ask me where my golf clubs were," relates Finlay in Redlands Country Club: A Centennial History. "I said, 'why, they're in the trunk of my car. Why?' She said, 'Well, I just thought I'd ask because the clubhouse is burning down...' My clubs were safe from the first, but nothing else was. When I got to the scene, every inch of it was ablaze."
Redlands was only one of several clubs to suffer disastrous fires in their clubhouses . Fires in 1944 gutted clubhouses at The Victoria Club and Hillcrest CC; the latter made front-page headlines in the Los Angeles newspapers as more than 300 people attending a party were forced to flee. Oakmont CC's clubhouse went up in smoke in 1947.
What was lost in these fires were more than just buildings, which could be, and were, replaced. Gone also were all records and historical artifacts; in the case of Redlands and Victoria (the former a founding member of the SCGA and the latter having been founded just a few years after the turn of the century) that meant that much of the SCGA's early history was also destroyed.
Historical Note: Johnny Dawson, SCGA Greatest Golfer?
The Southland continued to grow during the "Baby Boomer" era and, while it was obvious that more golf courses were needed, real estate developers were snapping up available land. From San Diego to Los Angeles, many clubs were paved over for roads, houses and businesses. Moreover, penal taxation during the 1950s caused many golf clubs to go under; not until the passage of Proposition 6 to amend the California constitution in 1960 was the long-term success of golf in this region assured.
Southern Californians evidenced little, if any interest, in maintaining the heritage of its legendary golf course designers. Among the clubs which fell to the developer's wrecking ball were California Country Club (aka Cheviot Hills CC) in Los Angeles, which had been remodeled by Max Behr, and Fox Hills GC, a 36-hole complex in Culver City designed by George Thomas, Jr. (it's now the site of the Fox Hills Mall).
Counterbalancing those losses were many new courses built in the 1950s, some of which remain among the region's finest: public facilities such as Torrey Pines GC and Rancho Park GC and private clubs like Bakersfield CC, El Caballero CC and Glendora CC.
Hard as it is to believe today when one looks at the nearly 100 golf courses in the Coachella Valley, there was just one, O'Donnell Golf Club, at the end of World War II. But visionaries such as Johnny Dawson (see page 8), Ernie Dunlevie and others were convinced that the desert could became an oasis, and thus began the great desert flowering of golf courses.
Beginning with Thunderbird CC and Eldorado CC, the desert saw new courses spring up every year, a growth pattern that has continued virtually nonstop since that time. Many of these were surrounded by homes, while others were the focal points of destinations resorts as the area became a prime vacation spot, especially for "snowbirds" from the cold climes of the northern United States and Canada.
In addition to Dawson, Dunlevie and other developers, two other men were instrumental in putting the Coachella Valley on the map. One was President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who vacationed regularly in the desert and whose love of golf gave the game a shot in the arm. The other was entertainer Bob Hope, who symbolized Hollywood's love of the desert as a retreat and through his Bob Hope Classic pro tournament helped raise millions of dollars for desert charities.
Although some will argue whether it was a blessing or curse, the 1950s saw the debut of the "auto-ette" in Southern California. First introduced a few years earlier in Texas, the predecessor of today's golf carts was an adaptation of the gasoline-powered ice cream cart. Most clubs approved them only for use by those with arthritis or other physical disabilities (at The Los Angeles CC, they were known as "Arthritis Specials"). Clubs with tunnels eventually had to widen them to make room for golf carts but as the decade ended, it was clear that the golf cart was here to stay.
Historical Note: SCGA Amateur Championship (1940-1959)
While the 1940-1959 era was a down-and-up time for golf courses, those 20 years were among the most fruitful for Southern California golfers, some of whom -- such as Roger Kelly and Pat Abbot -- first came to prominence in the late 1930s and others whose stars rose during the 1940s and 1950s.
In addition to Johnny Dawson, Ted Richards, Gene Andrews, Frank Taylor and Bud Bradley (each of whom is profiled in this segment of the SCGA's centennial history), other notable names of the era were:
Littler was also noteworthy for the fact that, unlike many of the great players of his era, he turned professional and played what is now called the PGA Tour. He was the vanguard of a movement that has continued to this day.
Littler had won the 1954 San Diego Open as an amateur. He turned pro a few months later, won four events (including the Los Angeles Open) a year later and eventually captured the 1961 U.S. Open by one shot over Doug Sanders and Bob Goalby at Oakland Hills CC in Michigan.
Other local amateur stars followed suit including three who would go on to win "major" professional titles: Billy Casper (the 1959 and 1966 U.S. Open champion); Dave Stockton (winner of the PGA Championship) and, of course, Al Geiberger.
One other local golfer who went on to professional immortality was San Diego's Mickey Wright. Mary Kathryn Wright won the 1952 U.S. Girls Junior Championship, the 1954 World Amateur and was low amateur in the 1954 U.S. Women's Open. After turning professional in 1955, Wright went on to win 82 LPGA tournaments in a 26-year career, including four U.S. Women's Open Championships. In 1961, she won three of the LPGA's four "majors" and two years later won 13 LPGA titles, 40% of the tour's schedule that year. She was inducted into the LPGA Hall of Fame in 1964.
The emergence of Southern California golfers, the growing renown of the area's courses, and the success of the Los Angeles Open brought the pro tour and national championships to Southern California during the 1940-1960 era.
Begun in 1926, the Los Angeles Open (now the Nissan Open), one of the oldest events on the PGA Tour, was played on a number of private and public courses during its first 20 years. In 1945, it returned to Riviera CC where it would remain for nine years, an era that saw a number of memorable moments beginning in 1945. That year was notable because Sam Snead birdied the 18th hole to win the first of two titles and even more importantly for the fact that Babe Didrickson Zaharias became the only woman ever to play in the event.
However, the name most associated with the L.A. Open is, indisputably, Ben Hogan. "Bantam Ben" finished second to Byron Nelson in 1946, then won back-to-back titles in 1947 and 1948, setting the stage for his record-setting victory in the 1948 U.S. Open.
In 1950, less than a year after his near-fatal car crash, Hogan returned to Riviera only to have his "Hollywood ending" spoiled by Snead, who birdied the final two holes to force a playoff. A week later (due to weather-related problems), Snead defeated Hogan in an 18-hole playoff, but Hogan went on later that year to cement his legendary status by winning the U.S. Open at Oakland Hills.
The L.A. Open wasn't the only pro tournament to be played; Oakmont CC, Inglewood GC and other courses also hosted events and in 1952 the San Diego Open (now the Buick Invitational of California) began its life at San Diego CC.
Although The Los Angeles CC had hosted the 1930 U.S. Women's Amateur and Hillcrest CC had been the site of the 1926 PGA Championship, the post World War II period saw several other national championships appear in Southern California, beginning with the 1948 U.S. Open at Riviera CC, the first time the event had been held on the West Coast.
At 7,020 yards, Riviera was also the longest course ever used for an Open and it was in this tournament that the George Thomas, Jr.-designed layout gained its nickname of "Hogan's Alley" after Hogan's 8-under-par 276 for the four rounds set a tournament record.
The following year, the USGA brought the Amateur Public Links Championship to the newly built Rancho Park GC, a few miles from Riviera, and in 1954, the U.S. Junior Amateur Championship was held at The Los Angeles CC, where Bud Bradley defeated Al Geiberger in an all-SCGA final.
Although they didn't have the notoriety that exists today, two Ryder Cup matches were held in the Coachella Valley, with Thunderbird CC hosting the 1955 matches and Eldorado CC playing host four years later.
As the region was moving into nationwide prominence, so too was the SCGA growing far beyond merely an organization which ran tournaments. With the rapid growth of golf in post-World War II Southern California came a series of concerns in the areas of legislation and taxes, and the SCGA began to act as a coordinator of financial and personnel resources in these areas.
Throughout 1950s, the SCGA was instrumental in a long court battle that helped maintain the "independent contractor" status of caddies. But perhaps nothing that the SCGA did in the two decades following World War II equaled in importance the drive to win passage for Proposition 6 in the 1960 general election.
The battle over Proposition 6 was the culmination of a decades-long struggle over how golf courses should be taxed. Increasingly after World War II, the state of California and county boards of supervisors continued to raise levies on nonprofit golf courses by taxing them on the basis of their "fair market value" based on surrounding commercial and residential real estate, rather than on their recreational use value. More than 100 golf courses throughout the state closed due, at least in part, to penal taxation.
It took nearly a decade to reverse the taxation tide, but finally the state legislature passed a law which mandated that golf courses be taxed for recreational use. However, legal challenges required the state constitution to be amended and the vote on that change (which became Proposition 6) was hard-fought for more than a year.
SCGA minutes from that era reflect the thousands of hours put in by association directors, representatives from clubs throughout the association and two professional firms hired to spearhead the campaign. At the heart of the effort was a massive educational effort to help nongolfers understand that golf courses are a benefit to the entire community, not just to golfers. When the measure passed, it insured the survival of many clubs and paved the way for even more golf course expansion in the coming decades.
The successful fight to pass Proposition 6 was just one example of the increased maturity and importance of regional golf associations, such as the SCGA. Although the SCGA's core programs -- tournaments, team play and handicapping -- remained at the forefront of its activities, the association was also taking more of a public stance, as well.
In its dealings with the United States Golf Association, the SCGA sought to insure that its views and that of its members were well known and considered in areas such as rules and handicapping.
Locally, the SCGA continued throughout the next decade to lead the fight for fair taxation for clubs and to help marshal resources in other important public policy arenas, lending financial support and coordinating with clubs in legislative efforts and, where necessary, court tests.
The next two decades would see even greater expansion, with the founding of FORE Magazine, the establishment of the electronic handicap system, the construction of Golf House West, and other important milestones.
The 1960s and 1970s would also be a time of rapid golf course expansion and an era when Southern California golfers continued to make their presence felt on the national scene.
Nowhere was that truer than in Southern California. Houses and housing tracts - indeed, whole new cities - were springing up almost overnight. Freeways were being laid as quickly as possible (bulldozing, among other things, the region's once thriving rail rapid transit network known as the Red Cars). Cheap gasoline made it possible for people to drive wherever they wanted for work or pleasure.
The economic boom was also felt in the golf community. More than 150 golf courses were built in Southern California from 1960-1979, ranging from modest municipal layouts to elaborate country clubs. Golf course communities began to spring up, not all of which survived; many developers were simply a decade or so ahead of their time and some of the courses (and their surrounding communities) went by the wayside.
The "baby boomers" were having children of their own in record numbers and the whole society began to take on a more youthful look. Nowhere was that better symbolized than when John F. Kennedy became the youngest person ever to be elected President of the United States. It was a run that many thought would never end . . . until a sunny day in Dallas, Texas.
Perhaps America came of age on November 22, 1963; it certainly turned a page in its history and entered a turbulent era.
Led by a charismatic preacher named Martin Luther King, Jr., the civil rights movement ushered in new rights for all Americans. The movement was too fast for some, not swift enough for others. King was eventually assassinated.
The nation grew up in those 20 years. So did the golf community.
After the successful fight to pass Proposition 6 (which helped guarantee fair taxation for golf course and other recreational facilities), the SCGA began to mature into an organization that did more than just rate golf courses and conduct tournaments. Although the seeds of that growth were sowed by boards in the 1940s and 1950s, it was in the 1960s that the SCGA began to implement programs that would have long-term impacts on all golfers throughout the association.
Perhaps the most far-reaching program that the SCGA would institute would be association-wide handicapping, which began in the 1960s.
Prior to that time, each club kept its own handicap records, often on minutely detailed index cards (no latter-day pun intended) and often overseen by a single person who would be the club's handicap chairman for years.
But as the number of clubs began to grow rapidly through the 1950s and beyond, the problems also began to escalate. For one thing, not every club (especially new ones) was able to find someone who was willing to devote the hundreds of hours each month necessary to keep records. Equally important, clubs were becoming increasingly unwilling to accept handicaps from other clubs. By establishing an association-wide handicapping system, the SCGA sought to address both of those issues.
As computers began to become available (although the giant machines were for use only in large companies), several firms began offering "computerized" handicaps in Southern California ("mechanically calculated handicaps" might be a more accurate term). The SCGA's handicap committee, headed by Director Charles Laws (who would become SCGA president in 1964), not only undertook a review of those companies but also explored whether the SCGA should simply employ people to calculate handicaps on its own.
Instead, in 1964, the SCGA signed its first contract with Integrated Data Company, one of the first firms to calculate handicaps using data processing. Under the arrangement, IDC began calculating handicaps for all SCGA clubs whose members were using the SCGA Handicap System.
In order to facilitate the posting of "away" scores, the SCGA developed a green "Away Score Posting Sheet" which soon became a familiar site at all golf course facilities.
The quest for uniformity in handicapping was well under way, but not without some difficulty. Several associations in the eastern United States did not use equitable stroke control in calculating handicaps and the USGA attempted to eliminate it nationwide. But the SCGA, led by another former president Lynn Smith, held fast to its position and eventually, equitable stroke control became a nationwide concept, as did the concept of using the low 10 out of the last 20 scores to compute handicaps.
In 1972, the Northern California Golf Association joined forces with the SCGA to create a statewide handicapping system, an agreement that was in place until 1990 when the NCGA elected to transfer handicapping to the USGA Golf Handicap and Information Network (GHIN).
The rapid expansion of the SCGA, both in numbers of clubs and programs, brought changes to the staff, as well. For two decades, the association's day-to-day activities had been overseen by Executive Secretary Harold Dawson and one or two secretaries.
In 1962, Mel Gallagher, a public relations practitioner, was hired for a short time to assist in public relations and club relations. A year later, Ray Goates was hired in a new position, Executive Manager, where he would serve for two years.
Then in 1965, a young Iowa native named Newell Pinch took over as executive manager of the SCGA (a year later, his title was changed to executive director). During his tenure, the SCGA grew rapidly to become the nation's premiere regional golf association, implementing dozens of new and improved programs.
In an effort to reach out to all clubs, particularly those outside of Los Angeles, the SCGA began holding area and board meetings in other parts of the association. The board was expanded and members were elected from the northern coastal section, San Diego and the Coachella Valley.
One of the most important steps in the SCGA's growth took place when the board implemented an SCGA membership policy that included handicapping with every membership. For the past two decades, most members at SCGA clubs had taken advantage of the SCGA handicap, but it wasn't until 1965 that the policy became permanent. Dues were set at $6 per year.
"We needed to take this step," says Laws. "The concept of 'voluntary handicapping' was becoming harder to work with and made it very hard to create budgets for the SCGA. When we established an association-wide handicap system, it was time to fully integrate it into SCGA membership. It was one of the most important steps we could take."
Another important step was the establishment of FORE Magazine, the association's official publication.
Almost from the SCGA's beginning, outside parties had petitioned the board to have their publications serve as the SCGA's "official" journal, but each time the board elected not to go along.
However, by the 1960s, the board was realizing that being able to communicate with all members was becoming essential. "We just weren't able to get our message out effectively," says Lee Corwin, the SCGA director who headed the public relations committee in the mid-1960s and then became SCGA president in 1972. "Plus, we believed that our growing number of members made a publication not only desirable, but viable."
After spending hundreds of hours researching various possibilities, Corwin and his committee recommended, and the board accepted, a proposal to begin FORE Magazine in 1968. Peter Ueberroth (who would later head the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games and then become commissioner of baseball) and his partner, Wally Smith, eventually became the first publishers. USC golf coach Stan Wood and a Hollywood ad executive named Steve Gardner (who still sells advertising for the magazine) wrote copy for the initial issues; a prominent Anaheim attorney, Ralph Miller, contributed a three-part history on golf in Southern California. The first cover pictured SCGA President Gordon Booth with fellow Lakeside GC member Bob Hope.
Among other features, each issue contained the handicaps of each of the SCGA's 40,000+ members, a feature that was eventually dropped as the association continued to grow in size (to print all member' handicap indexes today -- even in very small type -- would take nearly 200 pages).
A year after it began publishing, the board accepted a proposal from an outside publisher who wanted to turn FORE Magazine into a monthly publication. However, that venture fizzled after five issues and the board quickly brought the magazine back in-house, hiring a respected public relations practitioner named Bill Elder to serve as editor and publisher. The magazine resumed publishing on a quarterly basis until 1985 when it went to its present bimonthly schedule.
As the SCGA's activities continued to expand, it was becoming increasingly apparent that the association needed to relocate its offices from downtown Los Angeles and a board study determined that the best way to accomplish that purpose would be to own its own building.
In addition, from the beginning discussions were held on whether the building could house not only the SCGA but all other golf associations in Southern California (the Southern California Section of the PGA, Southern California Public Links Golf Association, Women's Southern California Golf Association and the Southern California Golf Course Superintendents Association).
The first attempt was on land in the Silver Lake district of Los Angeles, where the board purchased a parcel of land on Silver Lake Blvd. and London St. But after drawing up plans for a two-story building featuring "free-standing portico units of white Medusa cement supported by eight columns of approximately 15-16 feet" and a reflecting pool, it was determined that the parcel wasn't big enough to support such a building and so it was sold.
The search continued with a couple of possible locations considered and rejected. Eventually, through the leadership of Director Sid Title (who became SCGA president in 1974), the SCGA's present location in North Hollywood, directly across the Hollywood Freeway from Universal Studios, was chosen.
In 1967, construction began on "Golf House West," which would, indeed, be the home of all Southern California golf governing bodies. Two years later, the building was dedicated; within the next two decades, the SCGA and the other associations would expand to the point where only the SCGA now resides at Golf House West.
As the SCGA's activities continued to expand, it was becoming increasingly apparent that the association needed to relocate its offices from downtown Los Angeles and a board study determined that the best way to accomplish that purpose would be to own its own building.
In addition, from the beginning discussions were held on whether the building could house not only the SCGA but all other golf associations in Southern California (the Southern California Section of the PGA, Southern California Public Links Golf Association, Women's Southern California Golf Association and the Southern California Golf Course Superintendents Association).
The first attempt was on land in the Silver Lake district of Los Angeles, where the board purchased a parcel of land on Silver Lake Blvd. and London St. But after drawing up plans for a two-story building featuring "free-standing portico units of white Medusa cement supported by eight columns of approximately 15-16 feet" and a reflecting pool, it was determined that the parcel wasn't big enough to support such a building and so it was sold.
The search continued with a couple of possible locations considered and rejected. Eventually, through the leadership of Director Sid Title (who became SCGA president in 1974), the SCGA's present location in North Hollywood, directly across the Hollywood Freeway from Universal Studios, was chosen.
In 1967, construction began on "Golf House West," which would, indeed, be the home of all Southern California golf governing bodies. Two years later, the building was dedicated; within the next two decades, the SCGA and the other associations would expand to the point where only the SCGA now resides at Golf House West.
Despite the plethora of new programs and activities, the SCGA's historical programs continued to expand in popularity. Team Matches gained new entrants as clubs joined the association and by the mid-1970s the program had been split into Thursday and Sunday (later Saturday) sessions. The growth of golf in the Coachella Valley resulted in the Desert Team Championship beginning in 1978.
The rapidly expanding popularity of the PGA Tour had an impact on the SCGA Amateur Championship. For one thing, the final rounds of several tournaments in the 1960s were televised in Los Angeles on KTTV. The number of entrants continued to rise but from 1963 (when Bruce McCormick won the last of his three SCGA Amateur titles) until 1985, no player won the tournament more than once.
The California Amateur streak is even longer; not since Dr. Frank "Bud" Taylor won back-to-back California Amateur Championships in 1954-55 has a player successfully defended his title. SCGA winners of the state amateur included John Richardson in 1961, Mac Hunter in 1972 (at age 16 the youngest winner ever), John Cook in 1975, Lee Mikles in 1977 and Mark O'Meara in 1979.
In 1967, the SCGA joined with several other associations to revive the Pacific Coast Golf Association and the Pacific Coast Amateur Championship. The Pacific Coast Amateur had been contested for a few years at the beginning of the century and by the 1960s, there was a need to revive the event.
"We wanted to establish a tournament that would provide a chance for West Coast players to receive consideration for Walker Cup," recalls Pinch. The first event was held at Seattle CC and was won by Dr. Ed Updegraff (among the players he defeated was Fred Couples).
After struggling for a couple of years, the SCGA helped stabilize the organization and held the event for the first time in Southern California, at Lakeside GC in 1972. Among the tournament's winners in the 1970s was former USC Trojan Mark Pfeil, who won in 1972 and 1974 and played Walker Cup in 1973.
In 1971, the SCGA, in cooperation with the California Interscholastic Federation, began the SCGA-CIF High School Invitational with competition for boys and teams (a girls competition was added in 1982). A stocky, long-driving La Jolla high school student named Craig Stadler won the first individual event. The second was won by Barstow's Mark Johnson, the first of 14 SCGA-related titles that the latter would capture in his illustrious amateur career.
In 1975, the first SCGA Tournament of Club Champions was held at California CC, and in 1978, recognizing the growing number and quality of seniors in the association, the SCGA Senior Amateur was created and held at Wilshire CC. Fittingly, perhaps, two of the SCGA's greatest players, Ted Richards, Jr. and John Richardson won the first four senior championships (Richards won in 1978, 1980 and 1981; he would win again in 1984).
Although the SCGA had always had several San Diego County clubs that were members, many other belonged to the San Diego County Golf Association. In 1970, discussions were held between the two groups about joining forces and in 1971, the merger was completed. The SCGA opened a satellite office in San Diego and two prominent San Diegans, Steve Horrell and Harold Tebbetts came on the SCGA board (Horrell became SCGA president in 1977 and Tebbetts was elected president in 1982).
With the merger, 21 new clubs joined the SCGA; the association now had 180 member clubs with 51,000 individual members, both record highs.
The number of innovative SCGA programs continued to grow. The association established a health insurance and pension program that clubs could offer to employees. Training and education programs were offered to golf clubs and turfgrass research was undertaken.
The "International Golf Panorama" was held in 1970, a precursor of the industry-wide symposiums sponsored by the National Golf Foundation a quarter of a century later. Discussions were being held on building a SCGA golf course.
Finally, the SCGA was instrumental in the founding of the International Association of Golf Administrators, which today numbers representatives from more than 150 different golf associations around the world.
There was also staff growth. In 1973, Tom Morgan became the SCGA's executive secretary; today, he is the SCGA's executive director. Later in the decade, Bill Paulson joined the staff to assist in running the SCGA's many tournaments; later, he would become executive director of the Northern California Golf Association.
But perhaps nothing would equal in importance a program begun in 1979. For the first 80 years of the SCGA's existence, the only way to join the association was through a club located at a golf course. However, with the growing popularity of the game came a vast number of people who had neither the time nor the money to join such a club.
Consequently, in 1979 the SCGA board moved to rectify that situation by establishing the affiliate club program, allowing clubs to be formed that weren't necessarily attached to a course. Many were formed within companies and other already established organizations; others came together simply because people banded together for fellowship and golf.
"It was a bold step by the board," recalls Pinch, "and it wasn't taken lightly. There was a great deal of discussion because this was a revolutionary step. But in the end, the board voted to approve the program."
The first affiliate club was the Jonathan Club in downtown Los Angeles. Today, 20 years later, the SCGA has nearly 800 affiliate clubs with more than 50,000 individual members.
More than 80,000 individuals belonged to the SCGA at the end of 1979, an increase of more than 100% in the decade. But even greater growth was on the horizon as yet another golf course building boom was to take place in the 1980s.
For the SCGA, the next 20 years would also see tremendous expansion of programs and services. New tournaments would be created and a new wave of mid-amateur golfers would turn the next 20 years into another "golden age" of golfers.
Computerized handicapping would enter a new era with the development of the SCGA Electronic Handicap System and the implementation of the Slope system of rating.
The SCGA's ability to communicate with its clubs and members would be greatly enhanced by the club delegate program and the SCGA internet web site.
Moreover, the long-sought dream of the SCGA owning and operating a golf course would become a reality in 1994 with the purchase and establishment of The SCGA Members' Club of Rancho California.
After 80 years filled with wars interspersed by uneasy moments of peace, a great depression and unalloyed prosperity, assassinations and atomic energy, Americans in the last two decades of the 20th century might have hoped for a sustained period of calm.
No such luck. Instead, the last 20 years have been a study in wildly fluctuating contrasts.
In 1980, Ronald Reagan (at age 69) became the oldest person ever elected President of the United States. Twelve years later, Bill Clinton (age 46) became the second-youngest person ever elected to that office.
In one sense, it was a period of unparalleled prosperity. The country labored through an economic recession in the early 1990s but by the end of the decade had basked in several years of minuscule inflation and sustained economic growth. The New York Stock Exchange's Dow Jones Industrial Average, which was as low as 759.13 in 1980, climbed to with a fraction of the 3,000 level in 1990. By May, 1999, it had topped the 11,000 mark.
Yet this was also an era when the word "downsizing" entered the American employment lexicon. Millions of people lost jobs in manufacturing, defense and other areas. Others saw their standard of living drastically reduced as they re-trained for new employment. Two-income families became the norm, a far cry from the "Ozzie and Harriet" family model of the 1950s.
The Soviet Union—for half a century the focus of America's foreign policy and defense strategies—collapsed in 1991. The Berlin Wall, long a symbol of Communism, was torn down in 1989. Peace accords were signed in Northern Ireland and between Israel and its Palestine neighbors. Apartheid died in South Africa. However, several times during the 1980s and 1990s, America and other NATO nations committed air power and troops to battle dictators in Africa, Iraq, Bosnia, Serbia and other hot spots.
Space exploration entered a new era when the first space shuttle was launched in 1981. Five years later, the world watched in horror as the shuttle Challenger exploded a minute after lifting off from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Shuttle flights eventually resumed and as the century closed the Russians and Americans were collaborating on the space station Mir.
Perhaps the most uplifting moment in space during the two-decade span occurred on July 4, 1997, when Pathfinder, an unmanned exploration vehicle built at Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, landed on Mars and transmitted dramatic, four-color photos of the Martian surface back to earth.
Few regions of the country were as impacted by the country's economic upheavals as was Southern California. The breakup of the Soviet Union led to a significant shrinking of the military-industrial complex and hundreds of thousands of local jobs vanished or were transferred to other parts of the country, an impact that was also felt at the SCGA as total membership declined six percent from 1991 to 1993.
At the same time, however, Los Angeles was becoming the new Ellis Island of America as millions of immigrants passed through the Southland en route to life in the United States. Many of these people stayed in Southern California and became golfers. SCGA membership has grown 13 percent in the past six years.
As has been the case throughout the century, golf course construction in Southern California has followed the economic fortunes of the region. In the early 1990s, during the depths of the downturn, only a few courses opened in the region each year. However, by the end of the century, dozens of new courses have been built, nearly all of which are high-end daily-fee facilities.
As has been the case throughout its history, the SCGA continued to find new and diverse ways during the 1980s and 1990s in which to be of service to its individual members and member clubs. Under the leadership of strong boards of directors and Executive Director Newell Pinch, the SCGA pioneered several innovative programs for its members. As the inception of the affiliate club program in 1979 brought in thousands of new members to the SCGA, a key objective was to fully integrate these new golfers into the association.
One of the simplest but most visible means was the introduction of the now-familiar black SCGA bag tag in 1981. "We wanted to offer our members a bag tag what would provide prestigious identification as they travel to courses around the country," said Pinch.
Later that decade, the SCGA Tournament Rack was developed as a focal point at clubs for SCGA and USGA entry forms. Both of these programs remain in place today.
The SCGA continued its long-standing commitment to turfgrass research by joining with the Northern California Golf Association, United States Golf Association and the University of California Riverside in 1989 to undertake a comprehensive study of kikuyu grass, seeking to discover whether it could be eradicated (no) or successfully managed (yes, with a lot of work). Following up in the 1990s, the SCGA was a founding member of the Southern California Turf Council, which continues to sponsor turfgrass research at UCR.
Not every program was successful. In 1984, the SCGA founded a travel division, hoping that its expertise in golf would be of benefit to both travel agents and members. But after several years, the SCGA board concluded that SCGA Travel wasn't accomplishing its objectives and ended the venture.
Perhaps no single invention has altered life in the United States in the past two decades more than the personal computer. Less than half a century ago, only about 100 computers existed in the entire world. Even two decades ago, computers were cumbersome machines relegated, for the most part, to large companies.
However, since 1980 computers have become commonplace not only in businesses of all sizes but in homes as well. Moreover, the development of the Internet and, in particular, the worldwide web has connected millions of people to the information superhighway.
The SCGA was already using mainframe computers to calculate handicaps by 1980, but a decade later it began a study to investigate the best way to fully integrate personal computers into that process.
Out of that study came the SCGA Electronic Handicap System, which the SCGA developed in conjunction with its long-time handicapping vendor, IDC Safeguard. From 1992 to 1994, the SCGA worked with all golf clubs in Southern California to have computers installed at every course and link those computers to the SCGA mainframe computer. All amateur associations in Southern California, representing both male and female golfers, have participated in a unified handicap system since that time.
In 1997, the SCGA began working with other associations around the country to found the International Golf Network, fulfilling a long-sought dream that would allow members of one association to post scores anywhere in the nation and have those scores routed back to their handicap files. As the decade comes to a close, 51 associations in 37 states and four countries are participating in the IGN.
Looking toward the new millennium, the SCGA is preparing to implement SCGA EHS 2000, a state-of-the-art upgrade which will used touch-screen monitors, a Windows-based application and the internet to make it easier for members to post and provide more timely updates to their files.
The 1980s was also the decade when the Slope system was introduced to Southern and Northern California. With more than 250 golf courses in Southern California at the time, the SCGA waited until it was sure that Slope would be a permanent part of handicapping before it began introducing it to Southern California. The delay also allowed it to evaluate how other associations fared as they introduced this alteration to traditional handicapping.
Based on what it learned, the SCGA elected to forego the use of "home course handicaps" and, instead, issue handicap indexes to every golfer.
In 1988, the SCGA began an intensive indoctrination program for all members, with articles in every issue of FORE Magazine through 1989, a pamphlet - "Everything you wanted to know about Slope (but were afraid to ask)" - distributed with the November/December 1989 issue of FORE Magazine, and regional meetings at which every SCGA club was required to attend. The theme was simple: "99 percent of all golfers need to know only two things: here's your index and here's how you convert it."
The implementation program was a huge success. "We felt that the best way to encourage golfers to use the Slope system correctly was to make them calculate their course handicap every time they played," says SCGA Director of Handicap and Membership Ray Tippet. "Looking back on it, I think we were correct."
That the SCGA was able to distribute vast amounts of information about Slope and handicapping was the result of a decision made in 1985 to shift FORE Magazine from a quarterly to bimonthly publishing schedule. With the exception of a short-lived attempt by an outside firm to publish the magazine monthly, FORE had been published on a quarterly basis since it was founded in 1968
However, as the association's activities began to become more varied, and with the building of a golf course seemingly on the horizon, the board approved a recommendation to shift to a bimonthly publishing schedule beginning in 1985. It was the first of several significant steps that would be taken over the years.
In 1989, the SCGA Directory of Member Clubs, which had been published as a part of FORE's March issues, was changed to a digest size and issued as a separate publication. In 1996, the SCGA joined forces with the Southern California Section of the PGA to produce the Southern California Directory of Golf, a complete listing of all Southern California courses along with a vast amount of information about both organizations. Today, this directory is the region's most comprehensive Southern California golf reference book.
The growing popularity of the internet and the SCGA's desire to provide more up-to-date news and information led the association to become one of the first regional golf associations to open its own web site (www.scga.org). The site was unveiled during the 1996 SCGA Amateur Championship, which allowed people to follow the tournament's progress regularly, as well as the U.S. Public Links Championship which was won that year by SCGA member Tim Hogarth.
In addition to rapidly changing news pages, the SCGA became the first association to allow its members to look up their handicap index files on the internet, a feature that continues to be the most heavily used section. The complete listing of Southern California golf courses was included on the site and SCGA members quickly became accustomed to using the e-mail and feedback features to communicate with the SCGA on a myriad of questions.
In addition to the web-site, handicap-lookup feature, the SCGA added first a "900" and then a toll-free telephone number (1-888-724-2202) through which members could also verify their handicap indexes, the first association to offer this service.
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the SCGA spent a great deal of time and effort seeking to either build or purchase a golf course for use by its members and by the association for some of its qualifying and championship events.
As early as 1973, the board of directors had recognized the growing need for such a facility, as even then the growing popularity of the game was making it difficult to find golf courses for tournaments.
Moreover, as golf courses once open to the public began to be converted into private clubs, the SCGA believed that it was imperative to create a daily fee facility for its members. The advent of the affiliate club program in 1979 gave this desire even more prominence.
Although several projects were discussed, the two most significant proposals were the Laguna Canyon project and the Firestone Ranch development.
In 1978, after meeting with The Irvine Company, the SCGA identified a parcel of land in Laguna Canyon and hired golf course architect Ted Robinson to lay out a 36-hole golf course. But after beginning the Environmental Impact Report process, a Laguna Beach city election saw the defeat of two proponents of the project, and the succeeding city council would not approve moving forward.
In 1986, the SCGA began negotiations with the Boy Scouts of America to develop a portion of its Firestone Ranch property in Brea. The original concept called for two 18-hole courses, a clubhouse, a new SCGA headquarters building and, in the future, a 200-room lodge. However, the inability to find a suitable access road into the SCGA's portion of the property led the quest to be abandoned in 1991.
At that point, the board began to shift its emphasis to finding a suitable golf course that could be purchased. Again, several properties were discussed and in 1993, the SCGA learned that Rancho California GC might be for sale.
Originally constructed as Murrieta Hot Springs Golf Club, the course was a classical example of the design work of Robert Trent Jones, Sr. (whose work in Southern California was well known through clubs such as Valencia CC, Pauma Valley, CC and Mission Viejo CC). Murrieta Hot Springs GC had been abandoned by its developers and the course had later been brought back to life as Rancho California GC.
In 1994, after lengthy negotiations, the SCGA purchased the course, renamed it The SCGA Members' Club at Rancho California, and undertook a series of extensive renovations throughout the remainder of the decade. Today, it is one of the nation's finest public golf courses, used by many of SCGA affiliate clubs and other groups for their events. It is home to dozens of SCGA qualifying events and is the site of the CIF-SCGA High School Invitational Championships and the SCGA Thursday and Saturday Team Play Championships.
While the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s are often remembered as a "golden age" of golfers in Southern California, the 1980s and 1990s have become another glittering time for Southern California.
Perhaps the most noteworthy is that from 1978 through 1998, Southern Californians won at least one USGA national championship in every year except 1986. In each of two years (1988 and 1991), local golfers captured four national titles. During this time frame, SCGA members won nine U.S. Amateur titles and eight U.S. Junior Amateur titles and the SCGA had 15 representatives on U.S. Walker Cup teams.
Two SCGA members won multiple USGA titles during that time frame, headed by the incomparable Tiger Woods, who captured three consecutive U.S. Junior Amateur titles followed by an unprecedented three consecutive U.S. Amateur titles (see page 11). David Berganio, Jr., won the 1991 and 1993 U.S. Amateur Public Links Championships (and, for good measure) the 1991 Pacific Coast Amateur Championship). On the women's side, Pearl Sinn won the 1988 and 1989 U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links Championships and added the 1988 U.S. Women's Amateur title, as well.
The list of other major amateur titles was extensive in this period, beginning with the California Amateur Championship, which has been won by SCGA golfers 11 times in the last 15 years. Phil Mickelson captured NCAA Division I titles in 1989 and 1990. Ron Commans won that event in 1981 and Todd Demsey captured top honors in 1993.
Commans and Demsey were two of six SCGA golfers who won the Pacific Coast Amateur Championship during the last two decades of the century. Another Pacific Coast winner was Jason Gore, whose Pacific Coast Amateur title and Walker Cup appearance capped a remarkable summer of 1997 that also saw him win the California Amateur and California Open on consecutive weekends, be a featured member of the Pepperdine University NCAA Division I champions and miss winning the NCAA individual and SCGA Amateur titles that year by a whisker.
In the midst of all of this glory, however, three names stood out: Woods; Mark Johnson (see page 10) who won 14 SCGA-related titles during a remarkable quarter-century run; and Craig Steinberg (see page 8), who won four SCGA Amateur championships in a 10-year-span, a feat equaled only by Johnny Dawson and exceeded by Dr. Paul Hunter.
The SCGA's explosive growth, a membership maturing in age along with the rest of the country, and the success of the SCGA Senior Amateur championship (begun in 1978), led to a rapid expansion of SCGA tournaments during the 1980s and 1990s.
The SCGA Four-Ball Net Championship (originally called the Two-man Better-Ball Championship) debuted in 1980 and quickly became one of the association's most popular events. The Tournament of Club Champions, which had begun in 1975, shifted to two sites in 1984 and three venues in 1993 to accommodate the growing number of clubs.
In 1984, the SCGA Mid-Amateur Championship began, and each year has the strongest championship fields outside of the SCGA Amateur Championship. It became a 54-hole event in 1998. The SCGA Four-Ball Championship was added in 1991 and a year later, the California Golf Association Senior Amateur Championship made its debut.
The burgeoning number of affiliate clubs led to the SCGA Affiliate Club Team Championship in 1988 and to Affiliate Leagues a decade later. A growing number of entries caused the SCGA to take the flights of the SCGA Amateur Championship and create a separate event, the SCGA Amateur Net Championship in 1993.
Finally, the SCGA and NCGA created a team competition in 1998, the Seaver Cup, named in honor of legendary amateur golfer Charles Seaver, one of only two people to hold the SCGA, NCGA and California Amateur titles at the same time.
An eight-man SCGA team, including many of the premier golfers in the association during the past 20 years, defeated its Northern California counterparts, 251/2 to 221/2 at the historic Ojai Valley Inn & Spa, whose golf course had been designed by George Thomas, Jr.
Throughout the century's last two decades, the SCGA has increasingly made its presence felt on a national scope, as well as regional. Many SCGA members have sat on the USGA's Executive Committee (Peter James, a member of The Los Angeles Country Club, is currently secretary on that body). In addition, the SCGA was instrumental in founding the Pacific Coast Golf Association (which annually conducts the Pacific Coast Amateur Championship) and the International Association of Golf Administrators, a group of more than 150 golf association executives from around the world.
One hundred years ago, five clubs founded the SCGA with the following purpose: "to promote interest in the game of golf; the protection of the mutual interest of its members; to establish and enforce uniformity in the rules of the game . . . to establish a uniform system of handicapping; to decide on what links the amateur, open and ladies championships of Southern California, and such other championships, as may be decided by the executive committee, shall be played."
Throughout the century, hundreds of board members, thousands of committee members and dozens of employees have worked unceasingly to make that dream become a reality for the hundreds of clubs and millions of individuals who have made up the Southern California Golf Association. Those members, in turn, have provided the reason and inspiration for the association's ever-widening scope of activities.
The men and women who founded the SCGA at the end of the 19th century could not even imagine the changes that would be wrought to this nation and to the game of golf in the succeeding 100 years. Yet, it is the genius of the game and of those who play it that, despite incredible advances in technology and other areas, the essence of the game remains as it was in 1899: genuine sport, fulfilling fellowship, constant challenge, ever-changing landscape.
On the horizon for the SCGA are EHS 2000 (a second generation of the association's highly successful handicap system) and many other innovations and concepts—many not yet dreamed. But the purposes established 100 years ago remain in force today as the SCGA enters a second century of service to the game.