OH, I love this magazine!
I love our game of golf and the way we come together on a monthly basis via Australian Golf Digest to swap stories and seek answers. I hope you get yours when you need them.
A couple of issues ago, I had a question about a putter I found. This forgotten, brass, branding iron-type short-stick spoke to me from the golf club barrel at the Cooma St Vincent De Paul, on the way to the New South Wales snowy mountains. There was something about the lure of a spirited child – the yearning of a mongrel puppy. I‘m not sure why, but it had to be mine – it had to know what love is. And like anything you find and fall for, you want to know the story behind it.
That’s how it was with the branding iron. I Googled, without any results. It did take me to a ‘make your own branding iron’ page, which roped me in for a while. So then I put it over to you, the readers, with some fantastic replies.
Thanks to Peter Millbrook in New Zealand, who was good enough to give the history. It’s an Align putter, from the 1970s, maybe early ‘80s. It was one of seven or eight designs from the legendary Harold Swash. His reputation within the world of putting is off the charts, and he’s gone on to coach the likes of Padraig Harrington, while having a hand in Yes putters, C-Groove and Lynx. If what I’ve read is true, it was Swash who invented the face-balanced putter. Yep. That Harold Swash – and the Align putters were the first foray down that road.
It warmed my golfing heart knowing history now lives in my bag, even if it’s a little ugly. Then there was an email from a David Gibb, who has the same putter. Only his wasn’t salvaged, but was the gift from one of the greats at his local course, Redland Bay Golf Club. Or maybe ‘chalice’ would be a better description of this Align putter, which only makes its way onto the course on the most special of occasions in the memory of a bloke called Ron Barry. Ron was an all-encompassing champion of matchplay, four-ball, foursomes, mixed foursomes – he won everything on hand at Redland Bay, including the admiration of his clubmates. He managed to shoot his age three times in competition, (scores of 76 and 77), going on to be president of the club.
I didn’t know Barry, but he sounds formidable and extraordinary. What I do know, and what I love, is the way stories get handed on from time to time. That the passing of a putter, as Barry did to Gibb on one Saturday in front of the members, gives renewed life to old lives and hazy stories. Gibb plays with the putter on Memorial Day at Redland Bay – a day dedicated to remembering those golfers that have passed away. He said, “Conditionally, it is my responsibility to pass it on to another member who will embrace the history of this putter.
“When I use it, long-time members will come and look at the putter and always say, ‘That’s Ron Barry’s putter!’” He may pass it on. He may donate it to the golf club. I like the use of the word ‘conditionally’, as if he already knows he’s not ready to give it up. But he’ll long remember Barry, as will others. And they will talk about him and how good he was; a little head strong and opinionated but with a terrific sense of humour. He could play golf, too. And, in the spirit that I love the most, he was a technological tinkerer. Just look at that lead tape all over the back of the putter. Now, I’m not comparing myself in any way to Barry, but before seeing the tape on his putter, I had already glued tungsten weights from a newer, fancier putter to the back of the face of mine. Clearly, we’re both in the search for just the right balance, something I hope you’ll find in these pages.
As with all great men, Barry had a nickname. It was ‘God’.
