Driving Range Larry

The "Finery of Golf"

Golf today is played on refined courses often designed by big names in the industry such as Palmer, Faldo or Norman. We have come to expect first class facilities and fairways manicured to impress. These courses come with the pressure to dress and equip to match the venue. I grew up on a 9 hole golf course that offered none of these, Hidden Valley in Cottage Grove, OR. It was a beautiful setting among giant oak trees but never a perfect golf course. The greens keeper worked overtime to keep the vital greens and surrounding turf green, the rest went brown. It was a pleasure to stumble across a similar rough neck golf course named Greasewood between Salome and Wenden, AZ. A nine hole par 32 golf course that wandered between cactus, bare desert, electric poles and scrub brush. Still the place had great spirit. It was built in the 1920′s and dedicated for Dick Wall Hall, a famous humorist in the area. He had mapped out an imaginary course going from Harqua, Hala and Harcuvar mountains in the area which visioned golfers cavorting about in the vast desert valley between. Greasewood cost for nine holes is $9. For $2 more, you can play the unfinished back nine which is out in the desert. The day I was there, local farmers, snow birds and other locals were all engage in a scramble tournament. A bareque was being prepared for them after the contest and Larry was guarding the driving range. Perhaps there more to enjoying golf than the finery of the new courses.