‘I’d rather play my hickories’
Hickory golfers play the game that once was
or most of us, the hoary old golf
cliché “you got good wood on that”
Not so for the Society of Hickory Golfers,
who in their classic plus-fours and argyle
socks are dedicated to preserving the
game of the wood shaft golf club, not to
mention the mashie and niblick, too. They
are dedicated, as they say, to preserving
the game’s oldest traditions by playing
classic clubs on classic courses. You may
not find them sitting on a Scottish hillside
watching over sheep between shots but
that's only because when they do go to
Scotland it is to play the old game itself in
the place where it was born.
It’s overstatement to say that hickory
golf is the latest rage, but it is surely
around. Ken Holtz, the former Wisconsin
resident who recently ended his term as
president of the Society of Hickory Golfers,
said there are about 300 members worldwide and that those who are willing to
travel could find a competition somewhere almost every week. One of those
F
events is the battle for the Kummel Cup, a
two-day hickory tournament that takes
place at the venerable Links course at
Lawsonia GC in Green Lake.
“There’s a real resurgence,” said Holtz,
who has moved to Arizona but still returns
to Wisconsin a few times a year to play
hickory golf. “I myself have given up
modern golf to play hickory (golf). It’s just
a lot of fun.”
North Carolina has the largest number
of hickory golfers, Holtz said, and Michi-
gan is another hotbed with 30 or more
Players line up with their hickory-shafted clubs on a tee at the Golf Courses
of Lawsonia in Green Lake. Top photo, participants in an annual hickory tournament called the Kummel Cup pose at Lawsonia earlier this season.
members. But Wisconsin has an active
group as well, especially at Neenah’s
Ridgeway CC where a dozen or so members
play nine holes of hickory golf on Monday
nights and 18 holes on Wednesdays.
And they would welcome others,
whether full converts or just idly curious,
to try the old game. Bill Ernst, one of the
Ridgeway hickory players, said members
of the society are encouraged to keep a
second set of hickory clubs so others can
see what hickory golf is like.
