Golf is in a recumbent state here in Vermont, before the full hibernation begins in what is likely weeks rather than months. In the chill season the Brattleboro Country Club is open only to members, and then only on the “old” nine holes, which takes some explaining.
A nine-hole course designed by Tom McNamara of Boston opened for play on July 1, 1914, setting the stage for the club's 100th anniversary celebration next summer.
Wayne Stiles redesigned the course in 1930, retaining one hole from the Bostonian's routing, the first, a 200-yard-plus par-three. When Steve Durkee's design expanded the course to 18 holes in 2000, the first hole went out of rotation. But it has been preserved for practice, occasional use during charity tournaments for fund-raising challenges, and for autumnal play on the Stiles' nine.
And it may be a bit of a museum piece as well. According to Kevin Mendick, who wrote “The Life and Work of Wayne Stiles” (2008, Notown Communications) with the late Bob Labbance, “It may well be the only Tom McNamara-designed golf hole in the world that still exists today.”...
The Brattleboro Country Club has been looking to both the past and future in recent months and continuing what club president Jason Kelley calls an effort to reintroduce the club to the community. Taking note of the centenary, which will be official July 1, 2014, the club had club...
How long has Satan been on hold, calling to get his weather back? For the past month, we were slowly turning into fungi, slipping pans under leaks, cultivating mosquito farms. And then things got bad. The vents to Hades stuck open and suddenly the eternity of last winter didn't...
History does not record when the first oath flew or who uttered it after a wayward shot at the Brattleboro Country Club. But the odds are good that it was on July 1, 1914, the day the course opened for play. Players have been swearing or rejoicing over the grounds ever since, enraptured by the abundant pleasures and torments of golf. As the club moves toward its centennial next year, the keepers of the flame hope for another “brilliant occasion,”
In August, I noted that Vermont had 24 breweries, the most of any state per capita. Change that to 27 operating breweries and five in the planning or soon-to-open stages. Brattleboro's Whetstone Station is in the latter category, the restaurant up and running but brewing still a few months away. And presumably coming on line later this year will be the Burlington Beer Company and the Queen City Brewery in Burlington, Freight House Brewing in South Royalton, and Lost Nation...
Plenty of other beer writers are trotting out picks to constitute two “Twelve Beers of Christmas” six-packs, so I decided to have some fun with it, too. * * * The mother of all seasonal beers, of course, at least in the United States, is Our Special Ale from Anchor Brewing. The “Anchor Christmas beer,” as it is sometimes inaccurately called to no one's dismay, usually shows up just prior to Thanksgiving and hangs out until mid-January. For many years...
It might have been more than 20 years ago at some Midwest outpost we'd journeyed to that Stephen Beaumont and I idly speculated on who might eventually succeed the bard of beer, Michael Jackson. The British writer strode like a colossus over the world of beer journalism, having pretty much invented the discipline in the first place. The rest of us were pedaling furiously just to stay far behind. Still, I think I put my money on Steve anyway. The...
Some golfers let the season go readily. Others move south to avoid the problem. Those of us who winter on here eventually have to admit that golf is finished until the spring thaw. Eventually. The first of December revealed the first semi-serious blanket of snow on the ground. But with reports calling for temperatures over 50 by mid-week, the golf clubs remained in the car trunk, delaying the fatal move to the garage. Still, it's not premature for reflection about...