The Father of American Golf

Acclaimed by the Sports Writers of America as the The FATHER of AMERICAN GOLF

Alexander H. Findlay
1865-1942

A very brief synopsis of A.H. Findlay’s achievements

Played First Golf on U.S. Soil

Alexander H. Findlay, a Scottish immigrant to the United States in early 1887, became the first man on record - April 4, 1887 - to construct a golf course and play a round of golf, with his partner Edward Millar, over the six-hole layout. This first authenticated golf course was located on the Merchiston Ranch in Nance County, Nebraska, some 130 miles west of Omaha. The course was played on during the three-year period from 1887 through 1889 by Findlay, Miller, the Ranch cowboys and visitors and witnessed by other distinguished guests from out of the pages of history including William F. Cody (Buffalo Bill) and the Sioux Indian Chiefs, Sitting Bull and Rain in the Face.

Prairie Outdates Cow Pasture

John Reid, on February 22, 1888, played a round of golf on his improvised, three-hole layout in a cow pasture near his Yonkers, New York home almost eleven months after the Findlay golf course had become active on the Nebraska prairie. These two reports are the earliest, authenticated findings on the actual play of golf in the United States making Alex Findlay the first recorded golfer in America.

Establishes Golf’s Par for the Course

On August 6, 1886, while competing in a championship tournament at the Montrose Golf Links in Montrose, Scotland, Alex Findlay became the first golfer in history to score a round of 72 over 18 holes of play. Previously a round of golf was played to the regulation score of 81 strokes per game or an average of four and one half strokes per hole. An early newspaper article quoted Findlay as saying “I, myself, had the honor to lower it to four strokes a hole when I won the medal in 1886.” The breaking of this long standing score barrier marked the beginning of the modern regulation for par - that being 72 or an average of four strokes per hole. Regulation golf clubs, throughout the world today, strive to post a rating for their golf courses of 72. In the United States however, possibly due to the improve¬ment of golf equipment, which makes it easier to score, the overall U.S. golf course ratings average about 70 strokes. For golf course ratings to be lowered to an average of three and a half strokes per hole, a golfer would have to con¬sistently shoot rounds of 63 or better. Although a good number of professional golfers have scored 63 or even lower, the manner in which golf is played today would have to undergo drastic alterations to set the mark of 63 as par for the course. The record 72 set by Alexander H. Findlay 118 years ago in Scotland, remains today, the standard score for par in a regulation round of golf.

Pioneers, Promotes, and Popularizes Golf in U.S.

From the 1880s until his death in 1942, Alexander H. Findlay strived, enthusiastically, to lay the foundations for, and promote his beloved game of golf in the United States and many foreign lands. He painstakingly nurtured the golf seed he had planted on the Nebraska prairie, into a giant industry amongst the nation’s sports enthusiasts. Success was achieved by the “fatherly” devotion he displayed during fifty-five years of continual service in raising the infant sport to maturity and the acceptance of the United States as the world’s most powerful golfing nation was due, in no small part, to the Father of American Golf - Alexander H. Findlay.

His “fatherly” duties included:

1. Upon arriving in the United States, Alex Findlay’s golfing credentials declared him as a champion golfer of the country where golf originated, and to verify this claim, the twenty-one year old Scot presented to his peers, seven Golf Club Championship badges and the medal awarded to him for scoring the lowest round of golf ever record¬ed.
2. During the decade of the 1890s, Alex played on practically every U.S. golf course then in existence, beating most of the resident professionals at least once. In New England alone, he had then established thirty course records.
3. The latter part of the 1890s witnessed a frenzied enthusiasm for golf in America, which spawned a new breed of aggressive golfer who, in less than two decades, would wrestle the prominence of golf away from the British Isles. The amateur golfer, Alex Findlay, now in his thirties, chose to compete against these young and more agile golfers, in four U.S. Open Golf Championships from 1898 through 1903 and scored each time among the top contenders. He also contended and played in the U.S. Open for Tennis.
4. In 1898 he returned to England and persuaded Harry Vardon to tour the United States in 1900. It was then, and during subsequent golfing tours arranged by Findlay for Vardon, that these two golfing champions, playing under their respective colors, red for Vardon and green for Findlay, over 4,000 holes of golf together in the United States and Mexico. At the end of 4,000 holes Alex was up by 2!
5. On March 9, 1902, Alex Findlay defeated David Honeyman, the golf professional at the San Pedro Golf Club and F. C. Nieman, the professional at the Mixcoac Golf Club, to become the Open Golf Champion of Mexico. The gold medal, presented to Alex as winner of the Mexican Open Championship, remains in the Findlay Golf Collec¬tion.
6. He arranged U.S. golfing exhibition tours for other foreign golf champions, including the World’s Women’s Golf Champion, Joyce Whethered.
7. During his golfing career, Findlay played on over 2,400 different golf courses and was an honorary member of 250.
8. Findlay designed and built over 500 golf courses, of which many are still played on today, throughout the U.S. A copy of 111 of these golf courses is attached.
9. He was elected, as golf’s representative, to Philadelphia’s Sports Gallery Committee, hosted by the Benjamin Franklin Institute.
10. On February 18, 1941, he was appointed to the United States Golf Association Museum Committee at Golf House in New York City.
11. He collected some of the oldest golf antiques in the world including some golf clubs and balls dating to the mid-1700s. Although many of the artifacts were donated by Alex to the U.S.G.A. and other golf museums, the bulk of the golf collection is still maintained by the Findlay family.
12. Foremost, amongst his golfing achievements, was the personal promotion he paid to the golf game itself. Alex Findlay lectured on, taught, and demonstrated the sport throughout the entire U.S. and dozens of foreign coun¬tries. He wrote columns for newspapers, magazines, and other periodicals about the game of golf and spoke over radio, from Philadelphia, on his favorite subject - golf. Findlay arranged golf tournaments, banquets and even golf vacations to foreign countries and islands of the Caribbean. His last golfing engagement, shortly before his death, included Findlay as a member of the gallery at the Masters Tournament in Augusta, Georgia. Every golfer playing in the tournament that year signed their autographs on a piece of the Club’s stationery for their friend and golfing companion - Alex Findlay. The memento of the occasion can be seen in a giant scrapbook on the life of Alex Findlay and the history of golf in the United States, which was compiled by his son and grandson, and now in the possession of the Findlay family. Along with this, all facts as recorded in these pages can be viewed and verified as the truth as it actually happened and was recorded by historical scribes.

In short, Alexander H. Findlay, pioneered, promoted and helped popularize the game of golf during the full course of his life - he was, and remains, The Father of Golf in the United States.

A new article entitled "Father of Anything" is coming. Please return soon for that update.

We have a partial list of the nearly 500 golf courses designed and built by Alexander H. Findlay from 1887 through 1935. View it now!