Echo Shop Of St. Andrews Church history

Although, St Andrews was always well known as a golf-ball manufacturing centre, club making appears to have been more sporadic until 1819 when Hugh Philp began supplying the Royal and Ancient Golf Club.

The golfers would prevail when a local landowner and golfer James Cheape of Strathtyrum bought the links in 1821 to save it for golf.

The present Royal and Ancient clubhouse was begun in 1854 and is seen in the picture with snow on the eighteenth hole.

In 1856, Old Tom Morris, the “grandfather of golf,” laid out the first “double greens” feature which became a defining feature for links golf courses.

By 1857, there were second holes on the middle greens and the course became the first 18-hole golf course in the world.

Robertson died in 1859, and Old Tom returned to St Andrews to conduct extensive remodelling of the course as well as building others.

In 1863, Old Tom Morris was appointed Custodier of the Links by the R&A. Old Tom was a St Andrew's man who had studied under another great St Andrew's golfer, Allan Robertson, before Tom had gone to Prestwick to be appointed Keeper of the Green there.

The first playing of the Open at the Old Course was in 1873, the winner was Tom Kidd.

James Cheape had sold the Links in 1893 to the Royal and Ancient Golf Club who outbid the Town Council.

The Saint Andrews Town Council would reclaim ownership of the St Andrews Links in 1894.

The New Course was built by the R&A in 1895.

The Eden Course was opened in 1914 and the Strathtyrum in 1993. It was extended to 18 holes in 1905.

In 1974, with the demise of the Town Council following local government reform, St Andrews Links Trust was created by another Act of Parliament to continue running the Links as public golf courses open to anyone.

With the opening of the Strathtyrum Course in 1993, the total number of 18-hole courses was brought to five along with one 9 hole course, the Balgove.

In 1995, the first Clubhouse in St Andrews freely available to visitors was opened - the Links Clubhouse by the Old, New and Jubilee Courses.

In 2004, The Royal and Ancient Golf Club passed along its rule making authorities, one of only two golf governing organizations with the other being the USGA, to its offshoot organization, simply known as the Royal and Ancients or R&A.

With demand to play on the Links continuing to rise, the seventh course The Castle Course opened in 2008.

With the 29th staging of the world's premier golf event taking place again on the Old Course in 2015, St Andrews has held the event more often than anywhere else.

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