Alex Findlay

By Ken Love

For the Mirror

The man known by many experts as “Father of American Golf” may not be familiar to the casual golf fan, but Scottish immigrant Alex Findlay was the person most responsible for making golf a mainstream sport in the United States more than a century ago.

His work as promoter of the game and as a course architect — including several local courses — had an impact that can still be felt today.

Born in 1866, Findlay grew up in Montrose, Scotland and was introduced to the game of golf at a young age. He quickly mastered the sport and became one of the best players in Britain by his late teens. In fact, in 1886, Findlay was the first golfer to record the score of 72 in a professional tournament.

Soon after his 20th birthday, Findlay was on a boat to the United States to meet up with childhood friend Edward Millar, who owned a ranch in central Nebraska.

Findlay worked for Millar as a ranch-hand for several years, and actually built a six-hole links on the property that some say was the first golf course in the United States.

“People round about used to come and laugh at us for running after a white ball,” Findlay said in a 1926 interview with the London Evening Standard. “I therefore think that I can claim to be the founder of golf in the States, and it gratifies me considerably.”

In 1896, Findlay received a big break when he was hired to design the Palm Beach Golf Club in Florida. The success of that course led to many other projects in Florida.

The resulting notoriety led to a job with Spalding Sporting Goods to promote the game of golf and help sell equipment, and Findlay was soon involved in arranging the famous U.S. exhibition tour for British golfing-great Harry Vardon in 1900.

As golf was now becoming popular in America, Findlay continued to work even harder. He began designing courses all over the eastern U.S, and by 1920, several communities in central Pennsylvania became interested in his expertise.

Lock Haven was the first city to secure Findlay’s services, as Clinton Country Club’s original nine-hole layout was designed and built in 1920. In State College, Centre Hills opened its nine-hole, Findlay layout in 1921. Philipsburg Country Club followed with a Findlay-designed links of their own in 1922.

That same year, Findlay came to nearby Tyrone and was hired to re-design an existing layout after the city had acquired additional land bordering the community’s athletic park. The resulting links was widely praised.

Though the Tyrone course closed in the mid-1940’s, the Clinton, Centre Hills and Philipsburg courses are still in use to this day. Findlay went on to design an estimated 250 courses across the country until his death in 1942, including Tavistock Country Club, Llanerch Country Club and the Pittsburgh Field Club. He would also continue his work as a tireless promoter of golf clubs and golf balls that bore his name.

Findlay’s tremendous support of the game of golf during his 50-year career in the USA saw the game grow from virtually nothing to the mainstream sport it is today.

More than 100 years after his arrival in this country, golfers in our area, and all across the country, are still enjoying his handiwork.