He is also unhappy that he can no longer enjoy his clubs.
"The collection is so much bigger than I ever thought it would be," he said. "There is no place I can put the clubs. They stay locked up in a huge vault."
Today, golf clubs are mass-produced and made with steel. Until about 1930 clubs were made by hand with specially chosen types of wood. Like the majority of cabinetmakers, most golf club craftsmen did not sign their work. Ellis said not all club-makers were documented, and only four club-makers working before 1800 are known to have marked their clubs.
Some club-makers were so talented, however, they could be compared to great American colonial furniture craftsmen, famous cabinetmakers like the Goddards and Townsends of Newport.
The top lot in the sale, Number 260, is a long-nose putter stamped "A.D." that is attributed to Andrew Dickson of Leith, Scotland (around 1753). Dickson was one of a handful of club-makers who marked clubs with their own initials in the 1700s. Leith claims to be the true home of golf because it is where the earliest recorded game was played, in 1457, and where the official rules of golf were formulated in 1744 (before those at the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews, arguably the world's most famous course).
"That putter took my breath away when I first saw it," Ellis said. "Dickson's clubs have a distinct look. Every one is a hand-sculpted work of art."
Dickson grew up in a family of renowned makers of golf balls and clubs. A 1743 poem written by Thomas Mathison refers to a golf club made with the finest ash shaft and whose head was pond'rous with lead and fac'd with horn that was the work of Dickson who in Leitha dwells/and in the art of making clubs excels. It is also recorded that as a boy Dickson caddied for the Duke of York (the future James II).
His putter is estimated at US$200,000 to US$300,000.
Many top craftsmen were retained as official club-makers by golf courses like St Andrews. Such men might make and repair clubs, serve as greens keepers and caddies, even lay out the holes of the course. Inevitably a few also became the best players of their day. The sale includes several clubs made by these men.
"They were the first real professionals," Ellis said. "Prior to the 1860s the only money that changed hands in golf was at public winner-take-all matches, and when these club-makers won, they were able to take a portion of the winnings."
RSS