With Tom Morris as his apprentice, Allan Robertson made 1,021 featherie golf balls in 1840, 1,392 in 1841 and 2,456 in 1844. The work was hard, as shown recently by a review of autopsy reports of golf ball makers. Allan Robertson died at 44. Many of the Gourlay golf ball-makers at Bruntsfield also died young.
When was the dimpled golf ball invented?
In 1905, an English manufacturer named William Taylor registered a patent for a golf ball dimple design. Before long, all golf balls featured dimples that would be more or less recognizable today.
Who invented the first golf ball?
In the mid-1800s, a guy named Robert Adams Paterson made the first molded ball. He discovered that the sap from a sapodilla tree, native to Malaysia, could be heated up, placed into a round mold and would then dry hard.
How far did the feathery ball go?
The feathery was a very good first ball with excellent flight characteristics and distance up to 175 yards (the longest recorded distance at 361 yards), but was more expensive to make than a golf club and difficult to make perfectly round.
What is the oldest golf ball in the world?
Lying in a ‘dusty’ corner of a museum in Stirling is one of the most important artefacts in sporting history. It is an old ball with the identical construction to later feathery golf balls. It has been dated to 1514-1570 making it the oldest of its type in the world.
What country invented golf?
Golf originated from a game played on the eastern coast of Scotland, in an area close to the royal capital of Edinburgh. In those early days players would attempt to hit a pebble over sand dunes and around tracks using a bent stick or club.
What were golf balls originally made out of?
Until the mid-19th century, the featherie was the standard golf ball. It was made of cow or horsehide which was stuffed with feathers; most often goose feather. The leather, in order to be easier to work with, was soaked in water.
What is a Featherie?
A featherie, or feathery, is a hand-sewn round leather pouch stuffed with chicken or goose feathers and coated with paint, usually white in color. A standard featherie used a gentleman’s top hat full of feathers. The feathers were boiled and softened before they were stuffed into the leather pouch.
Why is a golf ball dimples?
Dimples on a golf ball create a thin turbulent boundary layer of air that clings to the ball’s surface. This allows the smoothly flowing air to follow the ball’s surface a little farther around the back side of the ball, thereby decreasing the size of the wake.
Who invented the first golf ball in 1400?
1400 First golf ball was invented by yina funez.
How much is a feathery golf ball worth?
According to the book Golf: The Science and the Art, the price of a single feathery ball from a reputable maker could range from $10 to $20 in today’s terms.
Are old golf balls worth money?
Because of the age and the craftsmanship put into these balls they are among the ones that have the highest price tag of collectible golf balls. These balls are referred to as antique, and goes for sums upwards of +$5000!
What edible substance is in golf balls?
As it happens, the interior of at least some golf balls would seem to be edible*, with Golfsmith noting that “Titleist, for example, has used a salt water and corn syrup blend” in their liquid core balls.
How was the first golf ball invented?
In 1898 Coburn Haskell made a discovery while awaiting Bertram Work, of the B.F. Goodrich Company, when he wound a rubber thread into a ball and bounced it. Haskell discovered it had a lot of bounce and upon Bertram Work’s suggestion to put a cover over it, the rubber Haskell golf ball was born.
What is the wood used to hit the ball off the tee?
Woods include the driver, which hits the ball farthest and is meant for use off of a tee, and fairway woods, which are designed to hit the ball off the ground.
Does golf ball contain honey?
As early as 1935 up until the introduction of solid core balls ,some golf ball engineers used liquid cores in balls that would otherwise have too much spin. Many of those liquid filled golf balls were filled with real honey.