From the beginning of golf in America, Long Island was there. Shinnecock Hills Golf Club in Southampton, completed in 1890, was the first 18-hole course in America and in 1894, became one of the five founding members of the United States Golf Association. It hosted the second U.S. Open in 1896, and subsequent Opens in 1986 and 1995.
Golf on Long Island burgeoned throughout the next century. During that time, many people who loved the game here played important roles in golf's development and success.
What follows is an attempt to single out the 10 most important people in Long Island golf history. They include the first PGA Tour commissioner, Joe Dey Jr., one of the first great amateur players, Walter Travis, and one of the best women amateurs, Marion Hollins.
Not included here is Robert Moses. The great park builder is responsible for the creation of golf at Bethpage because he is the creator of Bethpage State Park. But he did not spend a lifetime of involvement with golf, not like those who have made Newsday's list of the most influential Long Island golfers.
This is a consensus of a panel of Long Island golf experts who themselves have been passionately involved in the game. Two of the panelists, Joe Donahue and Charles Robson, are themselves named in the top 10 for their career contributions to area golf.
JOE DEY JR.
Joe Dey Jr. loved golf. He loved the game's integrity and its style. For the better part of four decades, Dey was at the very heart of golf in America. Born in Norfolk, Va., he spent time in Philadelphia, and by the time he arrived on Long Island, he was the executive secretary of the United States Golf Association and later its executive director, positions he held from 1934-69. Dey treated the rules of golf religiously, would brook no infringement of the rules or the etiquette of the game. He expected golfers to behave properly.
In the late 1960s, PGA Tour professionals were becoming unhappy with the PGA of America, the ruling body of club professionals, which at the time administered the PGA Tour. There was one man who they felt could execute the breakaway, establish a stand-alone PGA Tour and do it in a manner that was consistent with the tradition of the game. They called on Dey, who became the first PGA Tour commissioner in 1969.
Until his death in 1991, Dey lived in Locust Valley and was a member of the Creek Club. He was one of three Americans elected captain of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews, Scotland. He was revered and admired as a giant of the game.
WALTER TRAVIS
Walter Travis was Australian born, but came to New York in 1885, first to Queens, then to Garden City. He didn't take up golf until 1896, at the age of 35. Within four years, he was one of the best amateurs in the United States and one of the most influential players in all of golf.
Travis won the 1900, 1901 and 1903 United States Amateur Championships. He won the 1904 British Amateur Championship. When all the best athletes were in their 20s, Travis defied logic and age by winning major tournaments in his late 30s and early 40s. He was fondly called the Old Man.
His 1900 Amateur Championship was won at Garden City Golf Club, where he was a member. He was so revered at the club for his accomplishments that when he suggested changes to the layout, the membership obliged. He served as greens chairman for 10 years, wrote extensively about golf and became editor and publisher of The American Golfer magazine. He became a golf-course architect with noted designs at Westchester Country Club, Garden City Country Club, Cherry Valley Country Club and Canoe Brook.
MARION HOLLINS
In the first half century of golf in America, women played golf but were not part of its ruling elite. Marion Hollins changed that. Hollins was a great all-around athlete on Long Island, capable of world-class play in many sports, including polo.
But she excelled at golf, and in 1921, she won the U.S. Women's Amateur Championship at Hollywood Golf Club in New Jersey. It was her only national title, but her influence in the game went far beyond competition. At the time, women were often prohibited from playing on weekends at private clubs and were seldom allowed to be full members. So Hollins founded the Women's National Golf and Tennis Club in Glen Head in 1924, for women only. It was an immediate success, but the Depression took its toll and by 1947, the club was sold to members and renamed the Glen Head Country Club.
Hollins had moved west by then and had become close with noted golf-course architect Alister Mackenzie. She helped found two of California's finest courses, the exclusive Cypress Point Golf Club on the Monterey Peninsula and the public Pasatiempo Golf Club in Santa Cruz. No woman played as great a role in golf at the time as Hollins.
JOE DONAHUE
It would be impossible to calculate the number of hours, days, months and years that Joe Donahue, Garden City resident and member of Garden City Golf Club, has devoted to golf on Long Island and in the metropolitan area.
Donahue has been president of the Metropolitan Golf Association and the Long Island Golf Association and is now the LIGA's executive director. While at the MGA, Donahue was a tireless worker. He was active in fighting tax laws that he thought would overburden clubs. He ensured that the MGA played a major part in the United States Golf Association's handicapping service and because of his encouragement, the MGA became the first golf association to offer its members in-house computerized handicapping services.
