When was professional golf started

They played by striking a feather-stuffed ball with club-shaped tree branches. Golf was also traced back to the Song Dynasty in China during the years to The game was then outlawed by King James II of Scotland, as it detracted from the training for the military. Golf became a pastime in Great Britain in the seventeenth century, and that was a familiar theme throughout the world. In , the first British Open, a tournament that is still played today, had taken place. The popularity of the sport then began to spread throughout the entire world.

Then the current governing body of today, the Professional Golf Association of America, was founded in However, there are certain events that amateurs are not allowed to play in, like the world golf championships—the Accenture Match Play Championship or the Arnold Palmer Invitational.

These events are examples of professional events only. Mary, Queen of Scots often played, her clubs carried by students she called "cadets. James II organized the first international match, between England and Scotland. The courses back then were not always as seen in today's sport; golf in the 17 th century was not as formally arranged, with little organization regarding the number of holes or even official rules.

Formal golf courses did exist, however: clubs at Gosford, Blackheath a seven-hole course near London and St. Andrew's were regularly attended by the upper classes and nobility. Blackheath was founded as early as , while St. Andrews Royal and Ancient Club was founded in ; yet St. Andrew's lays claim as the cradle of golf. Lower classes played on open land; early illustrations of the sport show men playing among herds of sheep.

The early balls were made of feather and leather. In their earliest form, they were extremely difficult to make, and the makers could only produce about four or five per day per man. Balls became slightly cheaper to make by the mid th century, but would still cost too much to make golf balls accessible to the lower classes. However, the biggest difference between old golf clubs and modern ones was the use.

Originally, irons were used only for getting out of difficult spots: ditches, ruts and similar hazards. Irons were rarely used for approaches, and woods were used almost exclusively in most parts of the game. Today, while iron clubs are still used for hitting out of tough spots those clubs are called wedges , irons are also used for the approach, a development that did not occur until the mids.

This was helped greatly by the establishment of golf clubs not the equipment. In , a group of golfers calling themselves "Gentlemen of Honour" formed the Company of Gentlemen Golfers, now known as the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers, believed to be the oldest golf club in the world. The Honourable Company also drew up a set of rules for golf, and when the Society of St. Andrews Golfers came up with the St. Andrews code in , they drew heavily from the Honourable Company's rules.

These early clubs are actually aberrations: the vast majority of significant clubs formed in the s. Additionally, no golf club was formed outside of Scotland before , when the Honourable Company of Golfers was founded at Blackheath. By the s, the United Kingdom had around 35 clubs. The first club formed outside of the U.

The changes that primarily spurned this modernization were to the equipment of the game. Up to , golf balls, as previously stated, were featheries, made of feathers and leather. In , a man named Rev. Adam Patterson was said to have created the first gutta percha ball, or "guttie," a ball made of the rubber-like sap of he Gutta tree, native to the tropics. The guttie was much cheaper to make than its predecessor, and quickly became the standard of golf.

Additionally, gutties were much easier to repair, which added to their popularity. Initially the gutta percha balls were smooth, unlike the featheries, which cut down on the distance they could travel. However, in the s, manufacturers began using patterns on the surface of the balls to replicate the effect of the old featheries.

Later in the century, in the s, many companies began using molds to create the balls, making them even more affordable. When rubber companies like Dunlop, which still produces golf balls began mass-producing golf balls, the handmade gold ball business virtually disappeared.

The changes in golf balls also necessitated changes in golf clubs. It was the guttie ball that led to much greater use of the irons, while woods were made much firmer and fitted with leather heads to reduce wear. Both men were ball makers as well as players of the sport. Robertson and Morris, in fact, began working in the same shop Robertson's before a feud over golf balls led to the dissolution of the partnership.

Robertson was a fierce proponent of the featherie ball, while Morris preferred the gutta. Robertson even became the first person to break a score of 80 at the Old Course at St. Andrews, shooting a 79 with a feather ball. However, Morris, after leaving Robertson's shop, set up one of his own, a shop which still stands today overlooking the 18 th hole at St. Also called the British Open, the hole tourney was played at Prestwick; its first champion was Willie Park. In , the tournament site began rotating between Prestwick, St.

Andrews and Musselburgh and in , the Open Championship was extended to 72 holes which is what it is today. Golf had arrived, at best guess, at the tail end of the 18 th century, primarily in the northeastern United States. For the vast majority of the 19 th century, golf had a very difficult time gaining popularity in the U.

The nation was busy first with building itself and its Civil War; when Americans did preoccupy themselves with sports, they turned primarily to horseracing, boxing and, in the second half of the century, Baseball. Golf, in fact, took hold in Canada before the U. Andrews, gathered together a small group of friends and set up three holes in a cow pasture in Yonkers, New York, the first recorded golf course in the United States.

After playing through that summer, the group formed the St. Andrews Club of Yonkers in November, the first golf club in America. In , a group of Englishmen in Kentucky established the Middlesboro Club there, and by , there were nine more golf courses laid out in the U. Early on in American golf's history, Chicago became a key location: by , there were 26 golf courses around Chicago alone.

Within a year, the association had organized the first national Open and Amateur Championships. At the first U. Born in in Jersey, Vardon became the British game's greatest champion, winning the Open Championship six times between and No other player has ever won the British Open that many times. Vardon's rivals of the period were J. Taylor and James Braid, both of whom won five Open titles.

Since those three, only two other players have ever won more than four - Peter Thomson and Tom Watson. Between and , the 21 British Opens were won by one of the three 16 times. Vardon's influence, however, extended beyond the U. For one, he developed a new grip, slightly overlapping, now referred to as the Vardon grip. He came to the U. Open Championship on his first visit in Vardon, in his trips to the U. Anderson, however, was not a highly regarded player; he was extremely introverted, rarely speaking, and as a result gained little popularity.

Still, he could win - Anderson became the U. Open's first four-time winner, including a string of three straight titles from to No player has won more U. Opens in history with three other players winning four and no other player has ever won three in a row. Andrews professional broke a score of 80 on the developing course in In , the first purpose-built golf course was completed by "Old" Tom Morris in Prestwick, Scotland.

Soon after, the first Open Championship was played by top professionals in the country. Soon after, the best golfers around Scotland began playing in organized events with prize money. The U. Open in Newport, Rhode Island, featured nine professional golfers and one amateur.

It is widely acknowledged as the start of the professional game in the United States. The Professional Golfers Association was formed in Most members were golf course pros. This era was characterized by the play of three players on both sides of the Ocean.

Open Championships from to