This article was published in the Newsletter, October 2006. A subsequent article about work done on 11th Green was published in Autumn 2009 (click here).

To see Tom Simpson's painting of 11th green, click here

The Liphook course was designed during a golden age of golf architects, some of them as famous as the great professional golfers of the time including James Braid and Harry Vardon.

Liphook is the only course designed by Arthur Croome, founder of the Oxford and Cambridge Golfing Society; he died relatively young in 1930. His mantle was taken over by Tom Simpson, a partner in the same firm and considered one of the greatest golf architects. He was also a great friend of Liphook.

Simpson was a lawyer and learned his golf at Woking. He fell in love with Liphook and moved home to ‘Quinces’ in Bramshott. Croome and he shared the new philosophy of ‘strategic’ design which he had introduced to courses such as Sunningdale, Woking, Lytham & St Annes, Carnoustie and Rye (read more about ‘Strategic’ course design in The Liphook Story).

He was elected Manager of the Green in 1933 (his own version of ‘Chairman of the Green Committee’) but he was no ‘committee man’. On one occasion, when he thought the Committee was discussing proposals he had made, he drove his Rolls Royce slowly back and forth outside the Committee Room window. He resigned two years later.

Simpson made many improvements to Croome’s design including the mound (known as “Simpson’s Folly” right, top picture) to the left of the 9th green, intended to make players think where to place their drive in order to put their second on the green. He also introduced slopes in front of the bunkers on the 11th green (below, right), keeping the straight shot on the green but punishing approaches from the side.

He gave what may have been the only radio broadcast of the period on the subject of golf course architecture. When he died at the age of 87, the notice in The Times stated only: “Simpson – On 10th May, 1964, Tom Simpson late of South Warnborough. No flowers, no letters, no mourning.

/-- Liphook Archive Information --/
#Medium:Document#
#Location:Website#
#Date Of Event:1880- 1957#
#Date Item Created:2006#
#Author:Tony Rudgard & Jess Stiles#
#Copyright:#