# How were golf greens clipped closely in the earlier days of golf?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [April 15, 2005, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558 "2005-04-15T22:20:37Z")
**Posts on this page:** 12
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@I\_can\_t\_believe\_that\_s\_butter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_can_t_believe_that_s_butter)
#### Post date: [April 15, 2005, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/1 "2005-04-15T22:20:37Z")
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?
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### Author:  [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)
#### Post date: [April 15, 2005, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/2 "2005-04-15T23:32:09Z")
Sheep.
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### Author:  [@Lamar\_Mundane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamar_Mundane)
#### Post date: [April 16, 2005, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/3 "2005-04-16T01:29:37Z")
They used manual reel mowers that work the same way as the modern ones do. The technology is really old.
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### Author:  [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)
#### Post date: [April 16, 2005, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/4 "2005-04-16T01:44:47Z")
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.
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### Author:  [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)
#### Post date: [April 16, 2005, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/5 "2005-04-16T02:06:07Z")
> [@Lamar Mundane](#):
>
> They used manual reel mowers that work the same way as the modern ones do. The technology is really old.
Cite? From when?
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### Author:  [@samclem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/samclem)
#### Post date: [April 16, 2005, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/6 "2005-04-16T02:06:36Z")
> [@kunilou](#):
>
> 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.
Cites? From what time period?
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### Author:  [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)
#### Post date: [April 16, 2005, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/7 "2005-04-16T02:14:34Z")
[http://www.gcsaa.org/students/picturethis/history.asp](http://www.gcsaa.org/students/picturethis/history.asp)
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?)
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### Author:  [@Lamar\_Mundane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamar_Mundane)
#### Post date: [April 16, 2005, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/8 "2005-04-16T03:42:14Z")
[Here’s another one](http://users.crocker.com/~jricci/history.html)
> [@](#):
>
> With the invention of the reel lawn mower instead of spending many hours using a scythe, sickle, or shears to get an unevenly cut lawn one could now simply and comfortably push a reel lawn mower.
>
> The entry of the horse, wearing oversize leather booties to prevent lawn damage, drawing a very wide reel mower allowed vast estate lawns and playing fields to be more quickly and cheaply cut. The sheep were even displaced from the job of keeping the golf course fairway short.
> [@](#):
>
> ORIGIN: The first patent for a “Machine for mowing lawns, etc.” was granted to Edwin Beard Budding (1795-1846) from Stroud, Gloucestershire, England, on August 31, 1830. Edwin Budding entered into an agreement with John Ferrabee owner of Phoenix Foundry at Thrupp Mill, Stroud, to produce the mower.
>
> English manufactured reel lawn mowers were imported for many years before the first United States patent for a reel lawn mower was granted to Amariah Hills on January 12, 1868. However, reel lawn mowers were produced domestically at least by 1856.
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### Author:  [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)
#### Post date: [April 16, 2005, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/9 "2005-04-16T04:36:25Z")
> [@Joe K](#):
>
> 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?
This site supports the[sheep idea.](http://golf.about.com/cs/historyofgolf/p/timeline180050.htm) 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.
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### Author:  [@I\_can\_t\_believe\_that\_s\_butter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_can_t_believe_that_s_butter)
#### Post date: [April 16, 2005, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/10 "2005-04-16T06:43:54Z")
> [@David Simmons](#):
>
> 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.
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?
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### Author:  [@BobT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobT)
#### Post date: [April 16, 2005, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/11 "2005-04-16T07:00:55Z")
Golf, it has history.
[http://www.usga.org/turf/articles/management/greens/speed.html](http://www.usga.org/turf/articles/management/greens/speed.html)
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### Author:  [@I\_can\_t\_believe\_that\_s\_butter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_can_t_believe_that_s_butter)
#### Post date: [April 16, 2005, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-were-golf-greens-clipped-closely-in-the-earlier-days-of-golf/299558/12 "2005-04-16T07:18:14Z")
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.