THE WORLD'S OLDEST GOLF COURSE
The earliest documentation of golf being playing on Musselburgh Links is from 1672, which has earned Musselburgh Links the Guinness World Record for being the oldest golf course in the world. However, it has been reputed that Mary, Queen of Scots played on Musselburgh even earlier in 1567.
Musselburgh Links was originally seven holes, with another added in 1838 and the full nine-holes coming into play in 1870. The first three holes stretched eastwards from the grandstand at the racecourse, the site of the former clubhouse of the Honourable Company.
To the right is the main traffic route through Musselburgh, onto which the Musselburgh golfers used to slice their shots, then played back to the links using brass-soled clubs. The metal plate on the ‘brassie’ wooden club was invented in Musselburgh in 1885 to deal with such shots.
At the fourth green there still stands Mrs Foreman’s Inn. There used to be a hatch in the wall through which refreshments could be passed to the early golfers.
The course turns northwest with the next three holes following the coastline and the eighth returning south towards the Home Hole, which is now the present first hole.
The four and a quarter inch diameter hole became standard during the 19th century, its seemingly random size was just that, it happened to be the width of the implement used to cut the holes at Musselburgh and in 1893 the R & A made the size mandatory.
In its dominant days Musselburgh Links had a regular, undisputed slot in the Open Championship circuit.
The routine returns to Musselburgh Links for the Open were only disturbed when the Honourable Company decided to move their play away from Musselburgh Links to take up a new home at Muirfield.
When the club moved out, there was confusion about who was to continue to run the Open, and on which course it was to be played. When the decision to move came in 1892, to the distress of the Musselburgh players, the Honourable Company assumed that the Open would move from Musselburgh Links to Muirfield with them.
During their stay at Musselburgh Links, the Honourable Company sponsored and ran six Open Championships.
Our Tour commences here with our introduction to Scottish golf being similar to that depicted in the photograph above. A 'Hickory Challenge' over the old course has been organised to give us a taste of the good old days, and to see what golf was like!
