Golf’s Unsung Hero:
The Dentist Who Teed Us Off
I personally think golf is kind of a silly game. However, an awful lot of folks take it very seriously.
I never cared much for golf myself. Part of that is because it demands a great deal of time, particularly if you aspire to do it well. As I look back on my life with a discerning eye, it seems like I have been chronically busy ever since I was weaned. Most of that is admittedly self-inflicted, but I never seem to just sit down and do anything frivolous. That’s likely diagnosable on some level. My wife no doubt covets your prayers.
The other reason I never liked golf is simply that I sucked at it. Golf is kind of an integral part of being an Army officer. At least it was back during the French and Indian Wars when I wore the uniform. Golf is considered a gentleman’s game. Right, wrong, or otherwise, we were expected to be able to play it.
War Story…Well, Sort Of …
The commander of one combat unit to which I was assigned took this really seriously. For physical training (PT) every Thursday morning, all of the officers in the unit would meet at the post golf course and play a round as soon as the sun peeked over the horizon. By the time normal people started their day, we had already torn up the links.
We had to account for our time on the unit training schedule we submitted to our higher headquarters. We listed officer’s PT at a certain grid coordinate every Thursday morning. That grid reflected the location of the 1st tee. We did that for three years, and no one was ever the wiser. While everyone else was striving to shoot birdies, ace putts, improve their handicaps and similar mystical stuff, I was just the plucky comic relief.
Playing golf requires a set of golf clubs. I bought mine from a place called Speedee Pawn. They had already been through a house fire and were really cheap. I resolved to buy myself a decent set of clubs when my game improved to the point I could justify it. Eventually, my Speedee Pawn specials went out to the street with a sign that read, “Free to a Good Home.” It took three days for some poor schmuck to run off with them. Those were all the clubs I ever deserved.
Origin Story
Nobody is completely sure where golf came from. The modern version hearkens back to 15th-century Scotland. However, there were vestiges of the game played way earlier than that.
The game of paganica involved running about, smacking a small leather ball with a bent stick. The Chinese game of chuiwan was popular between the 8th and 14th centuries. Chuiwan was defined by striking a small ball with a club with the goal of sinking it into a corresponding hole in the ground. Cambuca in England, chambot in France, chowkan in Persia, and kolven in the Netherlands all seemed a bit golf-ish. Inexplicably, kolven was actually a game played annually to commemorate the capture of the assassin of Count Floris V.
Today, there are some 16,752 golf courses in the United States. Somewhere around 4.5 million Americans play golf at least 25 times per year. In February of 1971, NASA astronaut Alan Shepard smuggled a golf head and a pair of balls aboard Apollo 14 and took them to the moon. Shephard affixed the head to a tool used to collect rock samples and teed off. He shanked his first try. However, he supposedly nailed the second. That silly ball is probably out orbiting Uranus as you read these very words.
The golf tee is background clutter today. It was originally
envisioned back in the late 1800s by an African American dentist.
Tools
Like everything mechanical in the modern world, the tools we use to play golf have evolved considerably over time. Modern golf clubs are formed from such stuff as carbon fiber and titanium and incorporate more raw technology than SpaceX. However, one thing that hasn’t changed much in the past century or so is the humble golf tee.
A modern golf tee is 2.125 inches long, though longer or shorter versions are permissible. Per R&A and USGA rules, a golf tee cannot exceed four inches in length. Today’s tees are typically made from wood or plastic. However, in keeping with our current mad love affair with environmental stewardship, biodegradable and recyclable golf tees are things now as well.
The golf tee was first patented in December 1899 by a Boston dentist named George Franklin Grant. That first prototype was formed out of wood and a natural rubber called gutta-percha. Dr. Grant’s story is itself fascinating.
The Inventor of the Golf Tee
George Grant was a successful African American professional at a time when being a successful African American professional was pretty rare. Grant secured entrance into the Harvard Dental School in 1868 and graduated two years later. All medical professions were relatively crude back then compared to today. Back in the 1870s, the Germ Theory of Disease had only recently become mainstream. There wasn’t quite as much information to master then as is the case today.
Dr. Grant went on to take a position in the Department of Mechanical Dentistry at Harvard. In fact, Grant was the first African American professor at Harvard College. He ultimately became a founding member of the Harvard Odontological Society, later serving as its president. In 1881, Dr. Grant was elected president of the Harvard Dental Alumni Association.
Dr. George Franklin Grant was a pioneer in several ways.
In addition to contributions to dentistry in the late 19th century,
he also invented the ubiquitous golf tee.
Ruminations
Dr. George Franklin Grant was a trailblazing educator in the field of dentistry back in the late 19th century. In this capacity, he broke barriers and reached unprecedented professional heights. However, what this great man of science will really always be remembered for is the invention of the humble golf tee. Without that simple little wooden peg, the tee boxes at all of those 16,752 golf courses would soon begin to resemble the surface of the moon. Dr. Grant showed us that sometimes the most effective solutions are also the simplest.
