Newport Country Club has a legendary history, with just the right touch of romance and renown.

01:00 AM EDT on Tuesday, June 27, 2006

BY KEVIN McNAMARA
Journal Sports Writer

NEWPORT -- Exaggeration in golf, perhaps more than any other sport, is one of the game's time-honored traditions.

In 19th holes from Sakonnet to St. Andrew's, men and women spin tall tales about players whacking 350-yard tee shots, draining 40-foot snake-like putts or the duffer who somehow holed out an ever-elusive double eagle on a 500-yard par five.

When it comes to the history of golf at Newport Country Club, very little can be overstated. From the creation of the sport in the United States in the late 1800s, Newport has remained one of the game's magical names. Many golf clubs love to boast about famous events or members. Newport, like few other clubs in America, doesn't need to boast. Its legendary history, with a touch of romance from a long-ago era, does that job just fine.

The club's glorious heritage and present-day splendor intermingle quite easily on the magnificent piece of property wedged into the southern tip of the City by the Sea. Consider that after architect Whitney Warren designed the classic, Beaux Arts style clubhouse on a largely barren farm overlooking Brenton Point in 1895, his only other major Newport project was a home for his sister, Edith. The mansion, which overlooks Bailey's Beach and completed in 1900, was called High Tide.

This week, 106 years later, High Tide is playing a central role in Newport's latest coup, the U.S. Women's Open. The home happens to be where golf's hot, young flash, Michelle Wie, is staying for the week.

That a United States Golf Association event is back at Newport is no coincidence. "It's where championship golf began," said Betse Hamilton, director of the U.S. Women's Open.

Theodore Havemeyer, a wealthy sportsman whose family owned the American Sugar Co., played the game on a trip to the South of France in 1889 and returned to his summer home in Newport excited about its future. He convinced a few pals from the summer colony's social elite, men such as Hermann Oelrichs, John Jacob Astor, Perry Belmont and three Vanderbilts -- Cornelius, Frederick, and William -- to purchase the 140-acre Rocky Farm property for $80,000 and establish the golf club in 1893.

A nine-hole course was designed by William Davis, the club's first professional, and later expanded to 18 holes in 1915 by renowned architect Donald Ross. In 1923, Albert W. Tillinghast, whose credits include the Winged Foot Golf Club that tormented the world's leading male players two weeks ago, came to town to redesign the layout.

Anxious to host national competitions, Havemeyer invited the country's best amateurs to his new course for a championship in 1894. That December, Havemeyer held a meeting at New York City's Calumet Club with representatives from four other clubs: St. Andrew's (N.Y.), Shinnecock Hills, The Country Club in Brookline, Mass., and the Chicago Golf Club. These clubs agreed to form the Amateur Golf Association, the forefather of the USGA.

In October 1895, Newport hosted the USGA's first championships for both amateurs and professionals. To this day, the U.S. Amateur champion is awarded the Havemeyer Trophy.

THE STORY behind the classic Victorian clubhouse itself is filled with names of Newport's glorious past. Warren, an architect whose family had its roots in Troy, N.Y., became a summer Newporter in 1881 when his father, financier George Henry Warren, bought and renovated a home on Narragansett Avenue. George Warren became a part of Newport's Gilded Age social elite, as did his children. When he died in 1892, Warren left behind an estate valued at $7 million to $8 million, or nearly $200 million in today's money.

Young Whitney Warren left America for Paris and formal training in the arts a few years earlier and when he returned, he learned that several of his Newport friends had taken a liking to golf. The group was renting the nearby Bateman Hotel as a clubhouse for the 1893 season but, led by Havemeyer, the members longed for a building where they could relax and entertain their summer friends. Warren, no doubt because his brother-in-law, Robert Goelet, was one of the club's founders, secured the job for the first major commission of his career.

When the Y-shaped, wood-and-shingle building was completed in 1895, it cost $47,000 and the New York Times wrote that it "stood supreme in magnificence among golf clubs, not only in America, but in the world."

Warren moved on to become one of the most decorated architects in history, partnering with Charles Wetmore in designing New York's Grand Central Terminal, the New York Yacht Club in Manhattan, the Biltmore Hotel in Providence, the Broadmoor Hotel in Colorado and grand estates for William K. Vanderbilt, Winthrop Rutherfurd, Henry Whitney Munroe and many others. While not much of a golfer, Whitney was a sportsman who, in 1910, had his long swim from Bailey's Beach to Narragansett Pier covered by newspapers in the East.

Rhode Island's two greatest hurricanes, in 1938 and '54, battered the clubhouse. The '38 storm caused major damage and moved many directors to push for complete demolition. Instead, the building fell into a gradual state of disrepair. By the war years in the early 1940s, golf was not a Newport priority. The city had become a Navy town and demand to live in the great estates on Bellevue Avenue and Ocean Drive waned.

With just 56 members and in need of capital, the summer residents who controlled the club decided to offer memberships to some prominent local businessmen, including J.T. O'Connell, owner of the Inn at Castle Hill. Unlike other branches of Newport's society scene, there were few clashes between the old and new monied crowds at the country club.

"There never were that many golfers, especially younger ones," said Francis G. Dwyer, a local state legislator who was embraced by the club's leadership and sat on the board from 1958-2001. "I had friends from Florida come up in the summer and they couldn't believe that they were at this beautiful course in Newport, Rhode Island, and no one was around. Ever."

The social shuffle in those days saw the locals and "real" golfers play in the mornings and just before the lunch hour. Then the Bailey's Beach crowd would arrive and take to the first tee. While everyone may have hit shots onto the same greens, their paths rarely crossed.

EXCEPTIONS, HOWEVER, came during the club's annual tournaments. The oldest is the Count de Turin Tournament which dates to 1898. The event was created after the heir to the Italian throne, Prince Victor Emmanuel, spent a day at the club and enjoyed himself so much that he presented it with a silver cup. The most memorable Newport tournament is the annual Invitational, which dates to 1927. Members and out-of-towners such as Henry Ford, New York Yankees owner Daniel Topping and Robert R. Young of the New York Central Railroad were regulars in the event. Before the tourney, an auction pool, or Calcutta, was held at Bailey's Beach with heavy wagers placed on the favored teams.

Much of the smart money often fell on the shoulders of T. Suffern "Tommy" Tailer Jr. A big, strapping man, Tailer was both socially connected and an outstanding player. His duels with the club's pro, Joe Burke, and his younger brother, John Burke, were legendary. John Burke later died in World War II and the Rhode Island Golf Association's Scholarship Fund is named in his honor.

In 1969, the IRS sent the club a bill for $90,000, or its share of the Calcutta wagers. After a mild protest, the club later settled for a $42,000 fine and the days of the raucous betting in the Invitational were over.

GOVERNING AT THE CLUB was mysterious, as it is even at times today. According to Alan T. Schumacher's fine The Newport Country Club: Its Curious History, the reigning Governing Committee would often meet at Bailey's Beach or breeze through business. The notes from one session read: "The Treasurer's report was read and approved. The Executive Committee had nothing to report. The House Committee reported. The Golf Committee reported. The Green Committee reported. Adjourned."

In the late 1950s, history literally walked Newport's fairways. President Dwight D. Eisenhower established his summer White House just over the wall from the 10th green at Fort Adams. Although Eisenhower didn't know a member, club president Howard Cushing made it known that Ike was welcome any time at Newport. The two became fast friends, with Eisenhower and Cushing pairing with Newport pro Norman Palmer and an assortment of Ike's friends and Navy officers. Dwyer, who like Ike, was a Republican, also filled in for one memorable round.

"Jim Hagerty, the president's press secretary, wasn't feeling well after a party the night before, so Norman Palmer called me and asked if I'd like to play with the president," Dwyer said. "I told him I'd check my schedule."

According to his presidential papers, Eisenhower played at Newport 20 times in September of 1957 and 14 more rounds in September of 1958.

When Ike left the White House, Newport still enjoyed its status as the First Links. John F. Kennedy was already an adopted Newporter through his marriage to Jacqueline Bouvier, whose stepfather, Hugh D. Auchincloss, was a member at the club and lived a 3-wood away at Hammersmith Farm.

"There was no Secret Service around," said Dwyer. "I remember John-John and Caroline coming up the drive at the club in a pony-drawn carriage. The president was a good player with a nice swing. But his back really was bad. His caddy would tee the ball up for him and pull it out of the cup."

HISTORY STRETCHES through the years at Newport. Consider that the club's vice president, Robert Manice, is a descendant from the Goelet family, one of the founders. Barclay Douglas, now in his 19th year as the club's president, was a New Yorker whose family summered in Newport for years. For someone who's been known to pour over minutes of club meetings, Douglas savors Newport's past.

"A lot of people don't know the history of the club, even members," said Douglas. "We have families here that span four or five generations. That's very special."

The story behind one small corner of the property says a lot about Newport's history. Douglas said that before the 1995 U.S. Amateur (won by Tiger Woods), socialite Candy Van Allen, the wife of Newport Casino and tennis impresario Jimmy Van Allen, asked if she could help the event in any way. Douglas suggested carving a piece of wooded area behind the 18th tee to add length to what was already a great hole. Mrs. Van Allen agreed.

"Well she passed away three or four years ago and the estate behind there, which is about 50 acres of the most beautiful land you can imagine, was bought by a man named Dan Meyers," said Douglas. "We approached him about creating a new tee at an even higher point and he agreed. Now we have a tee that is absolutely gorgeous."

While the USGA is hoping for crowds of 30,000 on some days this week, stepping on Newport's grounds is one of golf's special, and guarded, thrills. Membership isn't about money, or cachet. It's location.

"I say 50 percent of our membership is local," said Douglas. "A lot of people want to be members at Newport, including a lot of people from Providence and around the state but we like to keep it for people in the Newport area, people who own property on Aquidneck Island or the surrounding area. It's a very special place."

A special, unique place that's steeped with history.

kmcnamar@projo.com / (401) 277-7340