The Musselburgh Opens.

In the previous ‘Preferred Lies’ we printed the advertisement for the 1892 Open and the 1892 Musselburgh Open. The Honourable Company, having taken the Open with them to their new home at Muirfield, upset the townspeople of Musselburgh, who had very much enjoyed having the Open played there every three years. Under the auspices of Willie Park Jr. and a local solicitor, John Anderson, a committee was formed to run their own Open at Musselburgh which was planned to be played at the same time as the Open at Muirfield. Prize money of £100 was offered, compared with the prize fund of £30 at Muirfield.

The matter of clashing dates was solved when the prize fund for the Open was increased from around £30 to over £100 – a similar amount to the Musselburgh Open – by the Honourable Company. It was felt that this was the only way to save The Open. Musselburgh did not increase their prize fund, but brought forward their event by one week; a move beneficial to the professionals with two tournaments and more money to play for. Appropriately, the Musselburgh tournament was won by Willie Park Jr. who played an immaculate last round in 36 and won the Championship from Tom Vardon by five strokes with a total aggregate of 305.

The tournament had been a unqualified success and continued for some years when the Open was held in Scotland. Notable winners were James Braid in 1901, J.H. Taylor in 1903 and Harry Vardon in 1906.

Much of this information comes from George Colville’s book ‘Five Open Champions and the Musselburgh Golf Story.’

(Introductary article
By Lionel Freedman.

For some years I wrote a column in the ‘Musselburgh News’ under the above pseudonym. This was some years before Angus Greig’s book of the same name which was published in 2006. (A must-read for lovers of Scottish golf).

The articles in the ‘Musselburgh News’ were to help build the profile of the Old Links and the young Club – Musselburgh Old Course Golf Club established in 1982. In 1993 the Club purchased the building which housed the Edinburgh Burgess Gollfing Society (later to become Royal Burgess after its move to Barnton in 1930 somewhat after its move from Musselburgh in 1894.

The column will vary with news of current events, personal golfing memories and journeys back into the history of golf. I hope it will be enjoyed.
The following adverts appeared in ‘Golf’ on 9th September 1892:

The story of how this all ended is fascinating….but more about this later.

The following is a gem from Harvey Penick’s ‘Little Red Book’:-

GOLF MEDICINE

“When I ask you to take an asprin, please don’t take the whole bottle.”
“In the golf swing a tiny change can make a huge difference. The natural inclination is to begin to overdo the tiny change that has brought success, so you exaggerate in an effort to improve even more and soon you are lost and confused again.”

“Lessons are not to take the place of practice but to make practice worthwhile.”