Newspaper Article 2008 – Club veterans go back fair way

Club veterans go back fair way

They say it pays to have a short memory in golf

Simply because it ensures misguided golfers will return time and again to conquer the man-made Garden of Eden.

But after more than 60 years, the bad scorecards aside, it’s amazing what the memory bank stores.

“I used to caddie for some old fellow who was really tough,” a jovial Stuart “The Emperor” Jones, who turned 84 last month said.

“He paid me sixpence a round, but not if he lost a ball.”

While not quite in the league of the former seven-time New Zealand Amateur champion, 85-year-old Jill Murley recalls the days when women were not permitted to wear trousers. “We had to wear skirts,” the Hastings Golf Club life member said: Which was more comfortable? “Look, it didn’t make any difference because it didn’t show up on our scorecards – well, certainly not on mine,” she said.

Mr Jones, also a life member, and Mrs Murley were among six others to be honoured at the weekend for being members at the Bridge Pa club for more than 60 years.

The others are all honorary members – Edna Farrell, 91, Jim Redgrave, 82, Mr Jones’ brother, Bryce Jones 82 and Jim Newbigin, 77. The men received silver tankards and the women silver jewellery boxes.

The recipients championed the Club’s spirit as the most satisfying factor in the countless kilometres they clocked over the years on the fairways of the 18-hole course.

“Everybody mixed around and played in tournaments with good team work,” said Mr Newbigin, a former Old Boys Hastings cricketer and former A grade squash player.

The 17 handicapper, a retired liquor merchant, said he was pleased to have given something back to the club serving as club captain for the past three years.

Mr Redgrave, a retired garden centre proprietor who has played just about every course from Wellington to Auckland, said there was tremendous fellowship on the course.

Calling himself an average golfer who had never dropped below an eight handicap, he recalled the days when the course was open from April to September and the greenskeeper used to hop on a bicycle to turn on the hoses at the greens.

Mr Redgrave proudly revealed he still walked the course for 18-hole rounds every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

“It’s not hilly like other clubs and the soil has a springy step to it. You don’t get muddy shoes here,” said Mr Redgrave, whose parents Frank and Evelyn were club members too.

by Anendra Singh
anendra.singh[@]hbtoday.co.nz
PICTURE/GLENN TAYLOR

Photo caption – HONOURED: Jim Newbigin, 77 (left), Edna Farrell, 91, Jill Murley, 85, Stuart Jones, 84, and Jim Redgrave, 82.