Back where it all began

The Curtis Cup Returns to Historic Essex County Club

By Gary Larrabee

What a natural. The 36th Curtis Cup, named after sisters Margaret and Harriot Curtis, returns to Essex County Club in Manchester By-the-Sea, where the legendary golfers honed their skills before winning four United States Amateur titles.

The Curtis Cup, inspired by efforts from Margaret and Harriot to encourage international amateur women’s competition long before there were women professionals, makes only its second visit to Essex June 11 to 13, with opening ceremonies scheduled for 6 p.m. on Thursday, June 10.

“There’s no better place for the Curtis Cup to be played than Essex,” says U.S. team captain Noreen Mohler, the Woburn native now based in Bethlehem, Pa. “The history of the club gives you goose bumps and the course is pure Donald Ross. That’s a grand combination.”

The club’s heritage may be goose bump-inducing to Mohler, but she hopes her American team, led by U.S. Amateur champ Jennifer Song and 15-year-old sensation Alexis Thompson, avoid goose bumps once competition begins the morning of June 11; at least after they hit their first shots of the day.

“You can’t help but be moved by what Essex means to women’s golf here and across the ocean,” Mohler said. “It’s why we’re here.”

“Now we get to add another chapter to our unique history,” adds Annie Barton, Event Chairwoman for the 2010 Curtis Cup. “I’m just thrilled by the concept of our wonderful history being connected to the newest generation of top women golfers from our country, Great Britain and Ireland. Hopefully their coming to Essex will give them a greater appreciation for the roots of women’s golf in this country and for two of the most important women in that respect, Margaret and Harriot Curtis.”

Curtis Cup 2010 General Chairman Bill Van Faasen could not agree more. At the same time, Van Faasen looks at the big picture and declares, “We as a club are delighted the USGA has given us this opportunity to share Essex County Club with the golf world. For all the proud moments we’ve had over the years, this will rank among the best.”

The First Cup At Essex

Margaret and Harriot Curtis were in attendance when the Curtis Cup was first contested at Essex on September 7 and 8 of 1938. In fact, Margaret provided a description of the Essex course for the competitors that certainly applies today, as George C. Caner Jr., author of the club’s centennial history book in 1994, pointed out. Curtis said,

“The course can be described as ‘honest.’ There are almost no difficulties that cannot be seen, and the ‘breaks’ are what one might expect. There is ample elbow room. Nevertheless, for some reason that is not easy to explain, it is a hard course to score well on. No man or woman has yet succeeded in ‘taking it apart.’”

The Curtis sisters attended several other Curtis Cups before Margaret died in 1965 at the age of 82 and Harriot died in 1974 at 93.

The sisters have always been regarded as golfing saints at Essex. As summer residents of the family’s nearby ocean front cottage, Sharksmouth, they played prominent roles in the launch and support of the Women’s Golf Association of Massachusetts (WGAM) in 1900, the first such women’s state golf organization in the country. As one might expect, women’s golf never took a backseat at Essex County Club. In fact, it was often the headline event.

“The impact the Curtis sisters had on women’s golf locally and beyond cannot be overstated,” says historian John Huss, an Essex CC member whose exhibit “The Remarkable Curtis Sisters” will grace the club grounds during the competition in a tent near the ninth green. “We as a membership surely do not hang our hat of singularity on the fact the Curtis sisters were so much a part of us for pretty much their entire lives. Yet there can be no members, living or deceased, for whom we hold greater esteem.”

Margaret Curtis, a U.S. Women’s Amateur finalist at the age of 16 in 1900, spent a good portion of her non-athletic time (she won the 1908 U.S. Women’s Doubles title with Evelyn Sears) assisting the victims of disasters and wars, as Caner’s volume noted. Whether it was the Great Chelsea Fire of 1908, her Red Cross work in Europe during World War I, her time with the Disaster Relief Commission in Greece from 1921-1923, the Great Depression or World War II, Margaret Curtis was always focused on helping the needy.

Margaret’s devotion to the game and her fellow man were never better recognized than when she received the fourth Bob Jones Award for Distinguished Sportsmanship in Golf from the USGA in 1958.

Famous Faces on the Fairways

The Essex membership has always recognized and exercised its obligation to the game. The club has hosted a variety of competitions over the years at the high school, college, amateur, and professional levels and frequently serves as venue for one-day charitable outings. The club was quick to respond when the Mike Frangos Commodore Open, the longest running one-day charity event in New England, was inaugurated in 1970. Essex has served as the Commodore Open site several times.

Essex has attracted golfers of every ilk to its fairways, from Presidents Taft and Wilson to golfing legends Francis Ouimet, Walter Hagen, Walter Travis, Harry Vardon, Babe Didrikson, Gary Player and Jack Nicklaus, to entertainers Bing Crosby and Al Jolson, to summer member Andrew Carnegie II, nephew of industrialist Andrew Carnegie and winner of the 1904 Massachusetts Amateur at Essex.

It’s all about the Curtis Cup in 2010, however, and the host team once again will be heavily favored. After its lopsided 13-7 victory at St. Andrews in 2008, the Americans hold a 26-6-3 lead in the series. It’s never been about the Brits and Irish. The United States won the first six meetings and have been in control ever since, with one exception.

The GB/I team dominated between 1986 and 1996, winning four times and tying one other time for a 4-1-1 record in that span. The U.S. has won the last six meetings.

The format had been of a two-day nature until 2008, when the USGA and the Ladies Golf Union agreed to revamp to a three-day, five-session, Ryder Cup-style competition. Stacy Lewis on that occasion became the first player to post a 5-0 record and Vesper CC member and current LPGA rookie Alison Walshe of Westford went 4-0.

“Playing for my country in the Curtis Cup at St. Andrews will always be one of the greatest experiences of my golfing life, no matter what happens after,” Walshe had told North Shore Golf & Tennis magazine at the time.

“Playing so close to home at Essex, home of the Curtis sisters, in 2010 would have been equally awesome, but my professional career couldn’t wait that long.”

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If you go

What: The 36th Curtis Cup

Where: Essex County Club, Manchester By-The-Sea

When: Thursday, June 10 (opening ceremony), Friday-Sunday June 11-13 (matches)

Who: A team of the best female amateur golfers from the U.S. will host a European squad from England, Ireland, and Scotland.

FORMAT: Foursome matches (Friday), Four-ball matches (Saturday), Singles matches (Sunday).

TV: Golf Channel Live Coverage: Friday (11 a.m. – 1p.m.); Saturday (11 a.m. – 1 p.m.), Sunday (2-4 p.m.)

Tickets: $30 daily, $75 all three days; available at club or on online at www.2010curtiscup.com

Championship Course setup: Par 70 (36-34), 6,247 yards; Course rating: 76.8, slope 133

Parking: Shuttle buses will be running from Cherry Hill Office Park in Beverly.