An interesting former golfer - Ralph Kennedy

[bkuehn1952]

I saw a short intro to a book about a prolific golfer, Ralph Kennedy.  I never heard of Ralph Kennedy.  Here is the intro about John Sabino's book, Golf's Iron Horse:

Ralph Kennedy played golf on 3,165 different courses in 48 states, nine provinces and more than a dozen countries. In total, he played over 8,000 rounds of golf during his lifetime. He was featured on a couple of Saturday Evening Post covers, radio and tv shows  and was the topic of many stories from golf and sports reporters of the day.

He was compared with Lou Gehrig during his playing days. Like Gehrig he was tireless. In 1931 he played 160 golf courses. While other golfers had played a lot of golf in the past, Kennedy kept the scorecard from each course he played. No one else had that type of proof. During his lifetime, Kennedy met all types of celebrities and, in fact, became one himself.

I am pretty sure I will come up short of the accomplishments of Mr. Kennedy.  I might look for the book in the library.

[Top100Golfer]

As Eeyore used to say, "Thanks for noticing." Kennedy's story is indeed amazing. He played between 1911 and 1953 and did most of his travel by train and then would take a taxi to the course and walk it. The breadth of courses he played was stunning. He played a lot of nine hole courses, munis, and courses with sand greens. He was a founding member of Winged Foot and that gave him good connections so he was also able to play at some of the best courses like Cypress Point, Pine Valley, Riviera, Baltusrol, Garden City, etc. He lived in New York City and was able to play 39 courses in the city, most of which have disappeared including those designed by Tillinghast, MacKenzie and Raynor. Personally, I thinks his most impressive accomplishment was playing Augusta three months after it opened. 

The other cool thing about his journey is the record he left. He donated all his scorecards to the USGA and they house them in their library and archives. I looked at many of them and they tell an interesting history. There are cards with half-par holes, segregated courses and many for courses which no longer exist. Almnost all the cards have a stymie measurement or gauge on them. 

The book's title comes from a 1935 article in the New York Sun where they gave him the nickname of "Golf's Lou Gehrig"

Edited February 5, 2017 by Top100Golfer