Trivial pursuit: Six degrees of separation involving the Father of York County, Pa., golf Grier Hersh?
Three hundred golf balls pour onto the green at the Country Club of York as part of a June 2007 fundraiser for the Susan P. Byrnes Health Center. (Each ball received a number, and the one landing closest to this 18th hole won the number holder $10,000.) (See photo of the old Country Club of York clubhouse below.) Also of interest: Exploring ornate Springdale, sunken ballroom and all and About Davy Crockett in York: ‘He is the biggest fool I ever saw’ and Miniature golf in York City? This putt-putt course had a roof
Country clubs and golf courses are having tough time in York County, branded the Golf Capital of the U.S. some years ago.
Grandview in Dover Township, reportedly the oldest public course around here, is being studied for development and could lose some holes.
Dover Township has purchased the little-known Midatlantic Golf Club and will turn it into a park.
Heritage Hills and Springwood’s 36 holes might be combined into 18.
West Manchester’s Hawk Lake is dormant until Memorial Hospital builds there.
So as a stab of levity in these tough times for the links, we’ll introduce the Father of Golf Grier Hersh. (To read why he can be called that, see: York, Pa.: America’s first capital of golf?)
Six degrees of separation: Grier Hersh and York College of Pennsylvania… .
1. York, Pa., businessman Grier Hersh was the turn-of-the-20th century resident of Springdale Mansion and estate.
2. By that time, he had built York County’s first golf course in the vicinity of his Springdale home.
3. Part of that course eventually became the Country Club of York.
4. The Country Club of York moved from the Springdale area to its current location in the 1920s.
5. The Outdoor Country Club, which started in the Avenues, moved in. Outdoor Country Club moved out, and in the late 1960s, York College of Pennsylvania moved in.
6. Grier Hersh, meet York College.
Club facilities at either the Country Club of York or Outdoor Country Club, both located on what is now the York College of Pennsylvania campus, are shown in this postcard view. For more about this clubhouse, check out: Country Club.
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