GOLF Club history
Saddleworth Golf Club was formed in May 1904 when a group of prominent local men and women met at the Mechanics Institute (now Civic Hall) in Uppermill and resolved to establish the club.
They moved incredibly quickly and, within a week, had accepted an offer to rent some rooms at Mountain Ash Farm and the adjacent parkland for 40 Guineas per year (plus a further £10 for fires and lights in the clubrooms). By the end of June, a ‘committee of enquiry’ consisting of three doctors, three mill owners, a bank manager and a solicitor had agreed a lease on the land and appointed George Lowe (ex-Carnoustie, St Andrews, Royal Liverpool and Royal Lytham & St Anne’s) to determine a layout for a course for the sum of 1 Guinea.
After a few years, it was felt necessary to consider extending the course to 18 holes, and a report was prepared by the famous golf course architect Dr Alister Mackenzie and W J Leaver. Dr Mackenzie was responsible for the design of Royal Melbourne, Augusta National, Cypress Point and Pebble Beach amongst many others. Their scheme was adopted on 25th October 1913. Work commenced immediately and was almost complete when the First World War broke out in 1914. Delay was inevitable, and the 18-hole course was not finally completed until 1922.
The Second World War and its aftermath caused a considerable slowing in the development of the club and the course for financial reasons. Still, by the 1960s, the club had a new lease of life as male membership soared to 300 and on to 400 by the early 2000s and many new additions and improvements to the course, the clubhouse, the lounge and dining room, car park, practice and changing facilities have been incorporated during this time.
using to help keep the top surface as dry as possible. “Fortunately, we have stayed cleared of much disease, and we haven’t used a preventative fungicide for the last few months. We have historically used around six or seven applications of preventative a year, but I would like to get this down to two or three. You have to keep your eye on the weather, and there are plenty of resources now available to let you know when the high disease pressure is going to be. I also have a weather station which helps give me some indication, coupled with my own experience.”
David and the club will look at what makes more financial sense when purchasing machinery. “We bought the Redexim Verti- Drain on finance due to the cost and our Toro Workman MDX-D’s outright as we didn’t see the need to put them on tick. We do have a leasing plan with John Deere, which has about a year left to run. With the price of machinery going up, I will have to take a look at what suits the course whilst working within the club’s budget.”
All servicing of machinery is carried out in-house except for cylinder regrinds. Chris Hyde is doing a lot of the work and is picking up some new skills along the way. David would like to send him on a machinery maintenance course, but there are no night or day release courses available.
With most treatments for the control of worms coming off the market in recent years, David is now starting to see a significant increase in the amount of worm casts around the course. “With the killers going off the market, and with what remaining active ingredient was in the soil wearing off over
the last few years, plus the dry period, they have been rife. We are now spending days blowing and switching the greens, tees and fairways. The increase in the worm population has attracted the moles which we didn’t used to suffer much with. We are also getting chafers and I have tried a few different products to try and keep them at bay, but I think we are always going to get them as most of the stuff is off the market for controlling them.”
The club and David do what they can to help improve the wildlife already thriving around the course. “There is a nature walk right next to us; we get a lot of roe deer and birds of prey here. It would be nice to bring the course back more towards a moorland course as, in the past, the club planted a lot of trees which took it more towards a parkland course. Moorland is its natural setting. We have been linking up habitat throughout the course, leaving rough longer for the birds. We have put up bird boxes, bee hotels and made insect hotels where we have been cutting down and pruning trees.”
The owner spent the equivalent of hundreds of thousands of pounds trying to turn it into a grass farm to produce grass, and he couldn’t do it
24 PC February/March 2020
“
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148 |
Page 149 |
Page 150 |
Page 151 |
Page 152 |
Page 153 |
Page 154 |
Page 155 |
Page 156
