http://www.crikey.com.au/2009/10/26/media-briefs-nines-top-gear-aint-cheap-the-story-news-ltd-didnt-want-you-to-read/

Stop the press: Barack Obama played golf with a woman. It’s apparently not enough for Obama to be surrounded two daughters, a wife and a mother-in-law at home, have Hilary Clinton as his Secretary of State or appoint Sonia Sotomayor as Supreme Court Justice. No, he must play golf with them as well.

Yesterday the front page of the Sunday NY Times led with an article dissecting the Obama administration “boys club”, where “some high-profile sectors of the White House — economics and national security, for instance — are filled with men and exude an unmistakable male vibe”. It complained that ladies weren’t allowed to join in and shoot hoops at a famed presidential b-ball game. Plus, no women have played golf with Obama since he became president, but that a senior White House aide, Melody Barnes, was due to play this weekend.

Now whether it was the NY Times article that prompted the tokenism or not, Barnes teed off with the president in surely the most widely reported act of presidential social togetherness since the beer summit.

Journalist Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun Times deemed it worthy of three separate pool reports , almost like a live-blog of the golf game. It lead with the wonderful headline ‘Obama golfs with Melody Barnes, first female in presidential foursome’:

“It’s a crisp, beautiful fall day with the leaves changing colors along the drive from Washington to the base, in Virginia. Obama was observed walking out of the White House at 12:18 p.m. wearing a black short sleeve shirt. Barnes was wearing a baseball cap, dark long sleeve shirt and beige pants. Marvin Nicholson, the White House trip director, was seen loading golf clubs.”

The NY Times reported that “Melody C. Barnes, a White House aide, broke through President Obama’s green ceiling Sunday afternoon”.

“Another crack in the gender glass ceiling” said the LA Times, with their article entitled ‘A first! President Obama actually golfs with a woman!’

As Politico noted, “Who says newspapers don’t have any influence anymore?” Now if only that influence was used for focusing on issues that actually matter. Amber Jamieson

Obama golfing now with Melody Barnes. Pool report 1

Lynn Sweet on October 25, 2009 12:55 PM

http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2009/10/obama_golfing_now_with_melody.html

POOL REPORT 1
From Lynn Sweet, Chicago Sun-Times/Politics Daily

PRESIDENT OBAMA GOLFING AT FORT BELVOIR; MELODY BARNES IN PARTY

President Obama's motorcade pulled in the gate at the U.S. Army's Fort Belvoir at 1:04 p.m. eastern after rolling out of the White House at 12:23 p.m.

Melody Barnes, President Obama's chief domestic policy advisor is among those golfing with President Obama at the Fort Belvoir golf course. This is noteworthy because of the spat of stories--the latest on the front page of the Sunday New York Times--about Obama playing basketball recently with men and no females. I just e-mailed White House Deputy Press Secretary William Burton asking him if Barnes was the first woman to play golf with Obama since taking office and Burton's reply was "not true."

It's a crisp, beautiful fall day with the leaves changing colors along the drive from Washington to the base, in Virginia.

Obama was observed walking out of the White House at 12:18 p.m. wearing a black short sleeve shirt. Barnes was wearing a baseball cap, dark long sleeve shirt and beige pants. Marvin Nicholson, the White House trip director, was seen loading golf clubs.

The motorcade stopped for lights leaving D.C. along New York Avenue before hitting the highway.

At 1:06 p.m. the motorcade with the president pulled up to the club house at Fort Belvoir and the van with the pool peeled off. The pool arrived a few minutes later at a Fort Belvoir food court, where we are holding.

Lynn Sweet

Obama gets grief for male-only basketball games
By Jimmy Orr | 10.25.09

President Obama’s in hot water again. And it’s that same old nemesis.
No, not Rush Limbaugh. The other really round culprit. You know, the basketball. Some critics are upset because he’s not more inclusive when he participates in the sport.
It’s not the first time the president has received criticism for his interest in basketball. Or his preference for men’s basketball, that is. Last March, a columnist for USA Today roundly criticizedthe president for not filling out a NCAA women’s basketball bracket — like he did for their male counterparts.

No girls allowed

Now the kerfuffle is over a game the president hosted at the White House last week. Although he reached out to Members of Congress and his Cabinet to play, all of the invitees had one thing in common — they were guys.

It’s certainly understandable why the president loves the game. After all, he’s from Indonesia Chicago where the greatest player ever to play the game graced the court. And if you don’t remember that, Michael Jordan will remind you of that (and then he’ll criticize you and everyone else for, well,everything).

But, shouldn’t the president extend invites to both sexes?

Old boys club?

NBC White House correspondent Savannah Guthrie asked him that earlier this week. She asked him if his preference for all-male hoops sends the wrong signal. Or as she put it, “Some people might look at it and say, ‘Gosh, there’s the old boys club again.’”
That’s something the president dismisses.

“I gotta say, I think this is bunk,” Obama told Guthrie. “Basically, the House of Representatives has a basketball game and they had wanted to play here at the White House court and we invited them.”

“I don’t know if there are women who— were Members of Congress who play basketball on a regular basis,” Obama continued. “I don’t think there are. You know, I don’t think sends any kind of message or signal whatsoever.”

Male vs. Female

That’s where there’s plenty of disagreement. A conversation on MSNBC’s “Cup of Joe” last week might provide some insight as to how people are viewing the issue.
The host of the show, Joe Scarborough, agrees with the president. Holding his head in his hands at one point during Wednesday’s program, the former Republican congressman seemed genuinely pained that his colleague — Guthrie — spent any portion of her one-on-one with the president on the issue.

Comparing the topic to flaky “balloon boy” coverage, Scarborough told Guthrie, “Speaking for all men — that was bunk. That question was bunk. What were you thinking?”

“This is a really interesting issue,” Guthrie began.

“No, it’s not,” Scarborough interrupted.

Guthrie explained that the disagreement over the issue seemed to break down across gender lines.

“Most men I talk to say, ‘What’s the big deal? So a guy can’t play basketball?’” she said. “But many, many serious thinking women say, ‘Let’s call this for it is: This is a networking opportunity. This is a political event.”

The Round Mound of Mikulski?

No matter what Guthrie could say, Scarborough wouldn’t buy it (see video below). At one point, he sounded like the terminally politically incorrect Michael Scott from the popular TV show “The Office.”

“Come on, what are you going to do? Invite Barbara Mikulski over to play basketball with you?” he asked.

Fans of the TV show might remember when Michael was putting together an office basketball team to match up against the warehouse workers. When his rotund middle-aged colleague Phyllis asked to play, Michael — like Scarborough — scoffed.
Of course, Michael changed his mind when Phyllis then volunteered to be a cheerleader.

“Oh yuck. That’s worse than you playing,” Michael said to stunned silence. Then he backtracked and promised Phyllis a spot on the team as an alternate.

As goes Scranton, so goes the White House

No one is suggesting that Obama is a presidential version of the regional manager for Dunder-Mifflin. But, judging how his press secretary responded to a question about the game, we’re guessing that the president, like Michael, will eventually come around.

“The President obviously is someone who, as the father of two young daughters, has an avid interest in their competing against anybody on the playing field. The President has certainly played basketball and other sports with women in the past, and I anticipate he’ll do so in the future.”


Yes, she can: Obama's golfers a men's club no more
(AP) WASHINGTON — The White House scored a stroke for gender equality in sports on Sunday.

President Barack Obama's chief domestic policy adviser, Melody Barnes, became the first woman to play in the president's golf foursome. She joined the president, Marvin Nicholson, the White House trip director, and Dr. Eric Whitaker, the executive vice president at the University of Chicago Medical Center, for a round on the Army's Fort Belvoir golf course.

Obama has been criticized for playing basketball with men and no women, most recently in Sunday's New York Times.

White House deputy press secretary William Burton confirmed the first. "He golfed with women on the campaign trail but not until Melody this year," Burton said.


Obama and woman go golfing (just like Adam Sandler and Bob Barker)

http://features.csmonitor.com/politics/2009/10/25/obama-and-woman-go-golfing-just-like-adam-sandler-and-bob-barker/

By Jimmy Orr

This should take some sting out of the earlier criticism.

President Obama went golfing this afternoon. No, he wasn’t being criticized for not golfing enough. He was getting some flak for not including women in his White House basketball games.

So what’s he do this afternoon? Asks a female staffer to join him for 18 holes. A big deal? Maybe, but only because since becoming president his golfing partners have all been men.

But that all changed today as the president’s chief domestic policy advisor — Melody Barnes — joined him.

As for the game itself, there’s no play-by-play. The pool reporters aren’t like that tall Frankenstein-like guy in the movie “Happy Gilmore.” They can’t follow the president on every hole.

So, therefore we don’t know if Obama and Barnes got into it like Bob Barker and Adam Sandler in said movie. Although it’s safe to say that probably didn’t happen. News would probably leak out.

That’s not to say there wasn’t a bit of controversy about the game — although it’s really, really minor. The pool reporter, Lynn Sweet from the Chicago Sun Times, asked the White House if Barnes was the first woman to play golf with Obama since he became president.

White House Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton said that was “not true.”
But when asked who the other women were, Burton did a 180.”

I was wrong about this — all apologies,” he told Sweet. “He golfed with women on the campaign trail but not until Melody this year. Sorry to all the people who were unwittingly misled by what I gave the pooler.”

Hey, we’ll always invite you to golf with us (even if you three-putt every hole)


New York Magazine

Barack Golfs With Pretty Lady

http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2009/10/barack_golfs_with_pretty_lady.html

President Obama has played a lot of golf since moving into the White House in January, but it wasn't until yesterday that a woman played with him. Obama's chief domestic policy adviser andknown hottie Melody Barnes joined him on the links today, where she carried a golf bag that was exactly the same size that she is.

The timing of Obama's invitation is a tad suspect. The Washington press corps has criticized him over the past week for his frattiness, from the all-dudes golf outings to the all-bros basketball games. Then the Times ran an article today titled "Man’s World at White House? No Harm, No Foul, Aides Say," that called Obama a "First Guy's Guy."

"Since being elected, he has demonstrated an encyclopedic knowledge of college hoops on ESPN, indulged a craving for weekend golf, expressed a preference for adopting a 'big rambunctious dog' over a 'girlie dog' and hoisted beer in a peacemaking effort."

So yeah, maybe Barack is kind of the Bro-in-Chief. But today is about Melody Barnes, who accomplished an unprecedented feat—she broke through the grass ceiling.

Woman joins Obama on the links [Washington Post]

By: Adam K. Raymond

12 Yr. old Mark Benevento, Jr. Out-Hits Tiger

Boy, 12, Out-Drives Tiger Woods

by Tom Henderson

Categories: In The News, Weird But True,Amazing Kids, Sports

http://www.parentdish.com/2009/10/22/tiger-woods-out-driven-by-12-year-old-boy/

http://www.parentdish.com/2009/10/22/tiger-woods-out-driven-by-12-year-old-boy/?icid=main|main|dl3|link2|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.parentdish.com%2F2009%2F10%2F22%2Ftiger-woods-out-driven-by-12-year-old-boy%2F

It doesn't matter if you're the fastest gun or the greatest brain surgeon. Someday, some kid is going to come along and show you up.

That day came for golf legend Tiger Woods on Oct. 4. He was out-driven by a 12-year-old kid.

A video from NBC Philadelphia tells the tale. Woods was in North Carolina to open a new golf course and hit a few tee-shots down the fairway. Two of them landed in the trees. Then he asked if anyone in the crowd thought they could do better.

Mark Benevento Jr. of New Jersey stepped forward. The pre-teen shot the ball 200 yards, right down the middle. Woods was stunned. "Do that again," he said. "We've got to see that again."

So the lad did it again.

"I was surprised because I thought I was going to top it or something," the middle schooler told the NBC affiliate. "[Woods] was clapping. He was really surprised that I could actually hit it."

More than surprised, he was duly impressed. "Well done, bud. Well done," he told Mark. "I'm proud of you."

Mark's father, Mark Benevento Sr., owns the Great Bay Country Club in Somers Point, N.J. He told NBC his son usually shoots in the high 70s. The father and son traveled to North Carolina to hear Woods speak at the first-ever Tiger Woods-designed golf course, still under development at The Cliffs at High Carolina.

"He [Woods] called me from a crowd of, like, 100 people," Mark told NBC. "I wasn't really nervous, but I got nervous when I stepped up."

You couldn't tell from his performance.

JFK's Private Course at Glen Ora

After the election, the President-elect leased a 400 acre horse farm called Glen Ora, which was near Middleburg, Virginia, a two hour drive or twenty minute helicopter ride from the White House.

They liked it there, and they purchased some land nearby and lived at Glen Ora during the construction of their own home, which they called Wexford, named after the town of Kennedy’s Irish roots.

While at Glen Ora, they tried to enjoy life outside of the Washington limelight. As Sally B. Smith wrote "…For Jack’s forty-fourth birthday on May 29, Jackie conspired with Paul Fout to create a three-hold golf course at Glen Ora – ‘rather long & difficult ones – so it will be a challenge to play and not just so easy that one gets tired of it.’"

"To further amuse Jack, she asked that the holes have Confederate flags that would ‘not be visible from the road.’ The Bradlees visited Glen Ora on May 20 for a birthday celebration, and Ben and JFK inaugurated the course, which had grown to four holes ‘9,000 square yards of pasture, filled with small hills, big rocks, and even a swamp,’ Bradlee recalled. JFK ‘shot the course record, a thirty-seven for four holes.’"

From Grace and Power: The Private World of the Kennedy White House By Sally Bedell Smith. (P. 201)


_

2009 Trump Cup at Pine Valley

2009 Trump Cup at Pine Valley

It's mid-September, and for the only weekend of the year, Pine Valley, the greatest golf course in the world, is open to the public.

As one of the most prestigious amateur golf trophies, the Crump Cup has a history that goes back some 85 years, and named after the former Atlantic City Country Club member who designed and built Pine Valley.

This amateur invitational was matched only by the Sonny Frazer Cup by the names of those who played for it and earned it, but when Bally bought the Atlantic City Country Club the Sonny Fraser Cup competition was discontinued.

While George Crump envisioned Pine Valley as a golf club that could be enjoyed by everyone, especially families, Crump died before the course was complete, and an Irish architect was brought in to complete the last few holes. The private golf club that subsequently grew at Pine Valley was somewhat divorced from Crump's vision of a family golf club, and excluded women, children and blacks, and probably Jews too.

Women still aren't allowed to become members, and only a few blacks have been members, and the public is not permitted in the clubhouse, and only on the grounds to walk the course during the Crump Cup competition.

The last time they had a major championship that was open to the public was a Walker Cup, decades ago, and that has not happened again, nor will it, most likely, ever.

But Buddy Marucci, of Villanova, Pa., the Captain of this year's victorious US Walker Cup team, was the runner up in the Senior Division, losing 3 & 2 to Pat Tallent of Vienna, Virginia.

Skip Berkmeyer of Saint Louis won the 85th annual Crump Memorial Tournament at Pine Valley, defeating defending champion Micahel Muehr 2 up in the semifinal match and defeating Gene Elliott of West Des Moines, Iowa, 1 up. Elliot had defeated Michael McCoy, also from West Des Moines, in the semifinal in 19 holes.

According to reports from the scene, Berkmeyer won both matches with a birdie on the final hole.

Like the Crump Cup tournament at Pine Valley, the Sonny Fraser tournament at Atlantic City Country Club was a very special amateur invitational, with many of the participants in one tournament also playing in the other, as they were usually a week apart.

Sonny Fraser was the son of James "Jolly Jim" Fraser, the golf professional at the Seaview Country Club, who when his father died, was taken under the wing of Seaview owner Clarence Geist.

A natural at golf, and growing up on the course, Sonny Fraser was the founder of the Atlantic City Race Course and was a powerful politician, the head of the State Assembly and was going to run for governor when he was stricken by disease. Even after he was diagnosed, Fraser started the tournament, inviting all the best amateur golfers he knew, and won the inagural Cup that bears his name.

Dr. Cary Middlecoff won the following year, while Julus Boros, Eddie Furgal and other famous golfers played and won the tournament over the years.

The Sonny Fraser Memorial Cup was a popular and important amateur tournament that should be revived.

Stiggy Hodgson at Merion - Walker Cup 2009

 

Stiggy Hodgson at Merion, September 13, during the 2009 Walker Cup.

Photo: AP/Mel Evans

How can you not love a sensational new golfer with the name Stiggy Hodgson, even if he does happen to be a Brit.

Stiggy made the team, and took two matches with Irish mate Kearney, but spent more time talking about how he got his name than how he played golf.

Here's how the Irish Independent reported it:

"DESPITE the best efforts of Royal Dublin's Niall Kearney, the United States easily retained the Walker Cup with a 16.5-9.5 victory over Great Britain and Ireland at Merion Golf Club in Pennsylvania."

"After storming into a 8-4 lead on Saturday, the hosts won three of the four Foursomes early yesterday morning to leave them needing just a further two points from the afternoon's 10 singles matches to lift the amateur title."

"The Americans had little difficulty securing the trophy as Rickie Fowley beat Matt Haines on the 17th hole and Cameron Tringale recorded an emphatic eight and six victory over Luke Goddard. However there was some consolation for Kearney who was one of the shining lights for the visitors over the weekend and won his singles match against Nathan Smith 3&2 last night."

"Kearney and English teenage sensation Stiggy Hodgson developed a strong partnership over the weekend and on Saturday morning, they registered a 3&1 victory in the last of the team matches to give Great Britain and Ireland their first point."

What was that you said?

Can you translate that into American?

The Yanks kicked butt, again, over the best amateurs from Great Britain and Ireland, but a young bloke named Stiggy Hodgson and a Mick from Dublin saved face in Philadelphia.

Merion Golf Club is in Philadelphia by the way, the City of Brotherly Love, and Redemption.

Merion is an historic golf course, over a century old, was once the Merion Cricket Club, and it also gives its name to the Merion Inn, the best and one of the oldest restaurants in Cape May (New Jersey).

It's also where many great tournaments and championships have been held, including the 1930 US Amateur, which completed Bobby Jones Grand Slam sweep, the 1950 US Open won by Ben Hogan after surviving a debilitating car crash (also see Hy Peskin's pix, the most famous photo in golf), and Merion is where Johnny McDermott witnessed his last US Open in 1971 when he met Arnold Palmer.

The Merion course has seen some historic golf, its clubhouse is legendary, and its history transends the Walker Cup, which almost went by unnoticed by the Mainstream media and even local press.

But it was covered by Joe Juliano at the Philadelphia Inquirer (founded by Ben Franklyn, who didn't invent the golf tee), and thank God for Joe, because he answered the question on everyone's mind, even those who don't give a rat about golf.

How did Stiggy get his name?



How 'Stiggy' got his name

In the Philadelphia Inquirer, Joe Juliano wrote:

Notes

His name is Eamonn Hodgson, but everyone throughout Europe who has played golf with and against the 19-year-old Englishman knows him as Stiggy.

So how did he get that nickname?

Hodgson, who was part of Great Britain and Ireland's two Walker Cup victories yesterday, explained that when he was 21/2 years old, his father needed to haul off some trash, so he accompanied him to the Dumpster.

"I was sort of messing around trying to help, being knee-high and stuff, and I fell in," Hodgson said. "I was rolling around, and I found a golf club. He thought it was a putter, but it turned out to be a mashie niblick, a 7-iron. That's how I started golf.

"As the story goes, there used to be a cartoon in England - I don't think it's run any more - called Stig of the Dump, so they called me Stiggy from thereafter."

The cartoon was based on the Stig of the Dump children's novel by Clive King published in 1963.

[http://www.philly.com/inquirer/sports/20090913_How__Stiggy__got_his_name.html]

Thanks Joe, I'm glad you asked.

And Stiggy Hodgson and his man Niall Kearney are two typical Walker Cuppers, young amateurs on the way to becoming professionals, but holding out in the amateur ranks long enough to play in the Walker Cup, in honor of Queen and Country. And they did a good job of it and should be proud.

But they probably don't know anything about the Merion's history, at least not until they got there, and I hope somebody showed them around the clubhouse and told them a few stories.

Arnold Palmer didn't play in the Walker Cup, but jumped right into the professional ranks after taking the US Amateur title.

Others however, like Tiger Woods, and this young class of Americans college kids, and they pretty much are kids, from both American and Great Britain and Ireland, with only one guy over thirty making the team as an alternate, if needed. Even thought they're all young, they know that the Walker Cup is all about history and traditions, and if they didn't know, I'm sure Buddy Marucci explained it to them.

Of course when they started these friendly matches between nations, which has fostered good will and some tremendous sport over the decades, it was a totally different game. When they began, the skilled and mature amateurs were the best golfers in the world and Great Britain and Ireland taking most of the matches. The first dozen US Opens were won by older British and Scott professionals, but most golfers were amateurs and so many of the best golfers were also amateurs.

Now things are reversed, and not only do the Yanks have a commanding lead, but the best players in the world are now professionals, and the best amateurs are really good teenagers, many of whom will enter the pro ranks when they get out of school.

Only a few, like Buddy Marucci, America's coach, are dedicated amateurs in the style and spirit of Francis Ouimet and Bobby Jones, and stay amateurs their whole life.

The youth movement in men's golf is matched by the women, I mean young girls, who have made waves in the game, and will continue to do so.

This new wave of amazing young golfers also opens up the possibility that, after nearly a century, one of the oldest and most respected records in sports could be broken. That would be 19 year old Johnny McDermott's 1911 US Open championship, which made him the youngest, as well as first native born American to win the national championship, which he did back-to-back (the sign of a true champion) in 1911-1912.

In 1971, a few months before McDermott died, his sister drove him to Merion to see the US Open. She left him in the Pro Shop while she took care of some business, and while she was gone, a young assistant pro thought the old man was in the way. He appeared disshelved, in a suit he'd had for decades, and wasn't recognized, and was told to go stand outside as he was in the way.

Someone then told the assistant pro, "Hey kid, you just kicked a two time winner of the US Open out of the pro shop."

Arnold Palmer saw what happened and went over and shook McDermott's hand and talked quietly with him.

Palmer later said he asked him for some advice and McDermott said, "All you can do is practice."

Shady Rest Golf at Scotch Plains

 

Shady Rest in Scotch Plains was first African-American club of its kind

Many thanks to Vicki Hyman for coming up with this gem of a photo, and story.

Althea Gibson, mentioned in the article, played in the US Women's Open at ACCC.

Before a black doctor from North Jersey invented the golf tee, you would have to pinch a little bit of sand from the sandbox to make your own tee. I wonder if the black doc who invented the golf tee was connected to this club? - Bill Kelly


Posted by Vicki Hyman/The Star-Ledger February 19, 2009 5:44PM

Categories: Black History Month, Must-see stories

Shady Rest was the first African-American club of its kind in the U.S., offering daytime sports and nighttime socials

On fine summer days, the Packards and Studebakers would pull up Jersualem Road in Scotch Plains, and men lugging golf clubs and women in crisp tennis whites would bound into the Shady Rest Golf and Country Club.

They'd play nine holes, or watch their kids practice on the clay tennis court, or go skeet-shooting. Maybe they thought of nothing but the prospect of cocktails on the wraparound porch, Miss Lillian's famous fried chicken and potato salad in the club dining room, or the big band that would play in the ballroom later that evening.
Nothing unusual about well-to-do Americans enjoying a summertime idyll. Except that all the members at Shady Rest were African-American, and this was the 1930s.

Shady Rest was the first African-American golf and country club in the United States. There were other black-owned or operated golf courses at the time, but none combined golf with other amenities typically associated with country club life, such as tennis, horseback riding, locker rooms and a dining room, according to Lawrence Londino, a Montclair State University professor who produced a documentary called "A Place For Us" about Shady Rest, and John Shippen, the resident golf pro who is believed to have been the first American-born golfer to play in the U.S. Open.

"I guess we didn't at the time, but now we know how important it was," says Annie Westbrook Brantley, 88, of Roselle, who grew up near Shady Rest and who met her husband there in 1938, while Duke Ellington played "One O'Clock Jump."

The clubhouse, which dates to the mid-1700s, began life as a farmhouse. It briefly served as a tavern until 1900, when the Westfield Golf Club turned the surrounding farmland into a golf course, according to Ethel Washington, the history programs coordinator for the Union County Division of Cultural and Heritage Affairs.

When the Westfield club merged with a Cranford club, plans were drawn to build a new 18-hole course at what would become the Echo Lake Country Club. A group of African-American investors called the Progressive Realty Co. bought the property in 1921 and opened Shady Rest.

The Jerseyland neighborhood around the club was predominantly African-American, but the club drew members from across northern and central Jersey, with guests driving in from as far as Manhattan and Brooklyn for a day in the country.

Shady Rest also featured prominently on the Jersey musical circuit, drawing big names like Ellington, Count Basie, Cab Calloway, and Newark's Sarah Vaughan.

Brantley and her sister, Rosabelle Westbrook Johnson, remember Chick Webb introducing a young singer named Ella Fitzgerald, who delighted the crowd with "A-Tisket, A-Tasket."

"We'd get a chance to see all of them," Brantley says. "The place would be packed. We would be dancing. It was a great time. All the boys came up there to meet the girls."

Back then she was too young to attend the dances, but Yvonne Cooley Whaley remembers her brother driving her to the clubhouse and parking outside so they could hear the music from the masters. Some white kids from the surrounding area did the same: Laura Swidersky of Scotch Plains says her uncles and cousin, who studied classical music, would hang around outside the clubhouse, "spending many a Saturday night enjoying the jazz that they rarely were able to imitate."

W.E.B. DuBois spoke there. The clubhouse was a popular spot for fashion shows and luncheons put on by African-American community groups, and it hosted a multitude of weddings.

Joan Cooley Carter's family moved to Westfield from Jersey City in the mid-1930s, and soon Joan was toting a tennis racket around wherever she went. Shady Rest is where Carter, now 77 and living in Carmel, Calif., met her husband, a member of the Cosmpolitan Tennis Club, the most prestigious black tennis club in New York.
Carter, whose older sister is Yvonne Whaley, vividly recalls another competitor from the Cosmopolitan, a tall, wiry and athletic young woman with a "cannonball serve" who "knocked the socks off everybody."

"You could tell she was really going to go somewhere," Cooley remembers. "She walked all over me, then looked at me and said, 'Next.'"

That woman was Althea Gibson, who became the first African-American to win a Grand Slam tennis tournament.

Shady Rest was also the home course to Shippen, another barrier-breaker who is not as well known as Gibson. Shippen may have been the first American-born golf pro, not just African-American pro, because until 1896, when Shippen made his professional debut at the U.S. Open at Long Island's Shinnecock Hills Golf Club, only European-born players had ever competed. Despite a threatened boycott, Shippen played in the tournament, coming in fifth.

"Most people only think of Tiger Woods, but here was somebody who was just as good over 100 years ago," says Thurman Simmons Sr., the chairman of the John Shippen Foundation. "If he had won that tournament at Shinnecock, we wouldn't even be having this conversation."

Shippen served as the club's golf pro and groundskeeper from 1931 to his retirement in 1960, only four years after the Professional Golfers Association rescinded its so-called Caucasian-only membership rule.

In Barbara J. Kukla's book, "Swing City: Newark Nightlife, 1925-1950," Shady Rest is described by one musician as the place "where all the rich black folks used to go," but many of those who remember the club were too young at the time to be aware of any class division. "There were a number of people that I knew who never went to Shady Rest and looked upon it as, well, something that they were not going to be able to participate in," Whaley says. "I don't know why they felt that."

Roberta Thaxton, 73, of Orange, says that her parents were not that financially well-off, but they were big believers in culture and apparently felt the $15 to $25 annual membership fee was money well spent.

A mounting tax burden, the Great Depression, and conflicts between two groups of investors led to financial problems, and Scotch Plains Township acquired the Shady Rest property through a tax lien foreclosure in 1938. The country club continued as a focal point of African-American social life through the 1940s and 1950s. In 1964, the town took over operations, renamed it Scotch Hills Country Club, and opened it to all.

The second floor of the building has been badly neglected, and the exterior has been so altered -- it's now clad in vinyl siding, the gracious wraparound porch long gone -- that it doesn't qualify for recognition on the National Register of Historic Places. It's also on Preservation New Jersey's list of endangered historic properties because at one point, the town had decided to tear down the building and replace it with a recreation center for seniors.

Richard Bousquet, who runs the Historical Society of Scotch Plains and Fanwood, says that the building may be extensively renovated to house the senior center, with some space reserved for an exhibit about Shady Rest's history and Shippen's legacy, although the project is on hold for now.

"I miss it really," says Whaley, who now lives in Edison. "That was really a time in my childhood that I thoroughly enjoyed. There's nothing like that out there now. You have to understand, I'm 80 years old, so my days of running around and looking and going to find Duke Ellington and Count Basie are practically over. My sister and my brothers and I keep talking about Shady Rest, and my kids say, 'We don't have anything like that.'"

Vicki Hyman may be reached at vhyman@starledger.com

http://blog.nj.com/ledgerarchives/2009/02/large_golf.jpg

Obama Plays Farm Neck Golf Club

President Obama begins vacation on Martha's Vineyard with round of golf

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2009/08/24/2009-08-24_obama_begins_vacation_on_marthas_vineyard_with_round_of_golf.html?print=1&page=all

BY DAVID SALTONSTALL
DAILY NEWS SENIOR CORRESPONDENT

Monday, August 24th 2009, 6:40 PM

OAK BLUFFS, Mass. - President Obama has been known to talk some trash on the basketball court, but on the golf course he leaves pride behind.

"I just want to say ahead of time that I am terrible," the First Duffer told a crowd of onlookers Monday as he began his vacation on celebrity-studded Martha's Vineyard with a round of golf. "Thank you."

With that, Obama stepped up to the first tee at the Farm Neck Golf Club, took two casual practice swings, then clubbed his drive a solid 200 yards or more - and into the woods left of the fairway.

The crowd cheered anyway, and Obama - dressed in a black golf shirt, brown pants, a beige cap and two-tone golf shoes - acknowledged his gallery with a small bow.

"Look at that - no mulligan," one woman exclaimed after Obama - said to be a stickler for the rules - declined to take a do-over.

Obama golfs regularly, but almost never in front of an audience. Experts on hand for Monday's rare peek at his form declared themselves impressed - to a point.

"He has a naturally athletic golf swing, very well-coordinated," said Farm Neck golf pro Michael Zoll, a PGA member who watched Obama warm up. "He does what few golfers do, and that is he trusts his wrists at the top of his backswing. And he generates a lot of club head speed not by trying to muscle the ball, but as a result of the natural timing he has."

On the other hand . . .

"He did push the ball to the left," noted Zoll, "and that came from his picking his club up, as opposed to swinging his arms more freely. . . . That kept the club face slightly open at impact."

Left unknown was the President's final score Monday in a round that included included UBS CEO Robert Wolf, Chicago pal Eric Whitaker and White House aide Marvin Nicholson. Once the foursome left the first tee, Secret Service agents kept the public and the press away.

Obama's sporting day also included a round of tennis with First Lady Michelle Obama at the family's rented 28-acre compound.

The President has no calls or meetings on his schedule at the moment, presidential spokesman Bill Burton said, but he is staying up-to-date with developments on the economy, health care and foreign policy.

Burton hit back at Republican critics who said Obama should forgo his week-long vacation when many Americans are struggling economically.

"As I recall, the previous President took quite a bit of vacation time himself, and I don't think anyone bemoaned that," Burton told reporters, referring to George W. Bush's month-long summer getaways. "I think it's important for the President, as with anybody, to take a little time, spend time with his family, and recharge his batteries."

Obama's plan for the week is not to have one, Burton said. "You know, he's on vacation, so everything is a little bit loose," Burton said. "You know, you wake up, you have some breakfast, you work out and then you decide, oh, what do I feel like doing today? He's doing that just like anybody else."

dsaltonstall@nydailynews.com