The Masters at Augusta National this past week acquainted all those who watched it (and perhaps all 15 golf enthusiasts on this message baord) with one of the upper echelons of green speeds. Of course, while such speeds aren’t personally known to many golfers, in general the greens are mowed with a length that does credit to moss or velvet, with thanks to the special reel mowers that cut all the way down to 1/8" or so—I’m told, however jocularly, that putting on textured linoleum just about captures the feel.
The lawnmower was invented in 1830, I have read, but did such a mower always cut so finely? What happened in the old days as to cutting the green so evenly—or, was it cut that way? How long did greens as modern-day golfers know them exist?
Golf course landscaping today is to its ancient Scottish roots as a modern poodle cut is to the working poodles 200 years ago – vaguely reminiscent and highly stylized.
Before there were mechanical lawn mowers, livestock grazed on the fairways and maybe they used a scythe to chop the greens a little more evenly. That’s about it.
The Golf Course Superintnendents Association has a very brief history section, but it looks like permanent groundskeepers were hired in the 1850s and the picture of the mower looks relatively old. (1860s maybe?)
This site supports thesheep idea. The first mower made especially for golf courses was made in 1832.
In the early days smooth greens weren’t all that necessary because the balls were feathers in a leather cover and weren’t all that round so as to roll true. This would make the surface of the green less important I would think. The green was just an area in the golf course where the grass was kept a little shorter around the hole. The gutta percha ball which could be manufactured to much tigther roundness tolerances didn’t appear until 1848. Up until then “greens” were nothing like those that came later.
Oh, yes, the featheries. They had slipped my mind, briefly. That makes enough sense, given those balls.
So I gather the billiard-like nature of putting is largely a 20th-century phenomenon?
My, my. That’s a great link. To think that such tabs were kept only since the thirties, with those details everyone is concerned with today since the cusp of the eighties. Very interesting.