Course Spotlight

Cork Golf Club (“Little Island”)

• Founded: 1888
• Designed by: Dr. Alister Mackenzie (1927)
• Location: File miles east of Cork City, on Little Island. Turn south off N25 at Little Island and follow the signs
• Restrictions: None, but call or write in advance
• Green Fee: EU80-90
• Secretary: Matt Sands
• Address: Little Island, Cork, Co. Cork. phone: (021) 435-3451; fax: (021) 435-3410; e-mail: corkgolfclub@eircom.net

The blaze spread so rapidly from one end of the building to the other that nothing but a few golf balls, four bicycles and some furniture were saved.
- Cork Examiner, May 29, 1945

The story of Cork Golf Club’s first half century went up in smoke in 1945, leaving us little idea about just how much a role that Alister Mackenzie had in the design of its distinctive and memorable golf holes. But it does the designer of Cypress Point and Augusta no discredit be associated with what is still one of Ireland’s finest parkland courses.

When Cork Golf Club was evicted from its home in Blarney for keeping whiskey in a cow shed, the members took in their stride. It would be just one of five relocations they would make in nine years before settling on Little Island, the site of a former limestone quarry. Perhaps the fact that British Army and Navy officers were prominent among its founders had something to do with this restless early existence.

The new site was promptly dubbed the Rock Farm. Instead of a cowshed, the maturing club erected a comfortable clubhouse more appropriate for its growing role as an exclusive sanctuary of the social elite in Cork City. There was no running water on Rock Farm, however, so it was necessary to pay less fortunate Cork citizens a few pennies to haul water up to the clubhouse.

From the beginning, the club was wealthy enough to hire an in-house professional from Edinburgh, and in 1909 the great Harry Vardon was lured to Cork for an exhibition match. The club took up Vardon’s suggestion that it snap up some adjacent property (the site of what is now the final five holes) so the course could be properly extended to 18 holes.

Many of the club’s military members did not return from the First World War. But Cork’s relative prosperity as an important Naval harbour kept what was left of the city’s establishment in the pink, and the club survived the turmoil of the Irish civil war with its finances very much intact.

Otherwise, they certainly wouldn’t have been able to hire Alister Mackenzie and his associate Jack Fleming. Thanks to the fire that destroyed all of the golf club’s records in 1945 we don’t know the details of Mackenzie’s involvement, though it appears he made a single visit, and left much of the follow-up work to his associate Fleming (who would later work on Cypress Point). Some have speculated that Mackenzie only tinkered with a few greens, but it seems unlikely that Mackenzie would have come so far to do so little, and there are so many outstanding golf holes on Little Island that it seems certain that his intervention was pivotal in turning a home-made layout into a truly exceptional one.

Certainly, the transformation was widely and immediately appreciated. Suddenly Cork began to attract a host of major tournaments. There were three Irish Championships (for men, women and juniors) in the late 1920s, and the Irish Open in 1932, in which Henry Cotton finished well back. The challenges to be found on the revised course also thoroughly tested the mettle of a promising junior member, Jimmy Bruen. He turned into a Ryder Cup star, arguably Ireland’s greatest player before an injury cut his professional career short.

Cork’s early glory period was brought well and truly to a close by the deprivations of the Second World War and by the fire that destroyed the clubhouse on May 28, 1945. The system of water porters may have kept the bar going, but it didn’t give the fire brigade much to work with.

For a time, the fire seems to have undermined the club’s viability, and its common sense. In the immediate post-war years equipment was so scarce that members were reduced to sifting through the ashes of the old clubhouse in search of bits of golf clubs that could be welded together. Yet that didn’t stop the club from rashly overextending itself on a new building. The insurance from the fire didn’t nearly cover the cost, and there was little money left over for staff. The greenskeepers promptly went on strike.

Things didn’t get much better until 1959, when 26 members kicked in 100 pounds each to put things on a sounder financial footing. The subsequent introduction of a sprinkler system in 1962 was followed by a rash of professional tournaments. The most memorable performance of all remains the 65 and 63 shot by Christy O’Connor on the final day of a 72-hole championship.

The Course

If you’re looking for evidence of the inspired hand of Alister Mackenzie you won’t see it from the first tee, the start of a simple, straightaway par four on gentle farmland. But as you emerge from some green-side trees onto the second tee, you begin to get an inkling of what lies ahead. Though also dead easy, the 2nd is a visually splendid par five, descending sharply through columns of trees down towards the wide Lee Estuary. The River Lee will be your constant companion for the next four holes, culminating in the fine par-five fifth, which combines an intimidating blind tee shot over a chasm and a treacherous approach to a green perched on the water’s edge.

Things change suddenly again on the sixth, a very short par four played away from the river over engagingly old-fashioned humps and swales. Then yet another physical feature is introduced. The 7th is a picturesque par three over rocky wasteland, and the eighth a spectacularly expansive par 4 played into an enormous depression in the earth. These are the first of the quarry holes, laid out on the remains of the original limestone pit. American visitors who stumble in this very difficult stretch can be consoled in the knowledge that stone from this spot can be found on many historic buildings in the United States, especially in Boston.

If there is a consistent quality to Little Island, it is in its capacity to surprise. In a span of 18 holes, the landscape shifts any number of times, from farmland, to waterside, to quarry, to rather dense woodlands. And then there is the 16th, a short, links-like par 4, that curls in a hook to a delightful green hidden in the swales. By the time you play the flat-out gorgeous 17th, a grand par four encased in its own little forest, you have long since realized that this is a very special golf experience.

One shudders a little at what a modern designer might have done to this strange and varying landscape, with the possibility of signature bunkers, huge modern greens, split fairways and other efforts to impose a consistent feel on the course. Despite its parkland setting, Little Island, like its principal architect, is closer to the roots of the game, and seems far more Irish than the fancy instant golf courses that have cropped up in its vicinity. Its capacity to surprise comes from the land itself.

Whatever Mackenzie may have contributed to Little Island’s lasting charm, it is safe to say that his legacy has been enhanced by the care the members have taken in their efforts to lengthen the course to meet modern requirements. The formidable tee shot on the 5th is their handiwork, as is the 11th green, which now hangs alarmingly on the edge of the quarry, turning what today’s golfers would consider to be a short par five into a delicate challenge.

The 11th is also where you will find a plaque and a Spanish chestnut tree marking the spot where Seve Ballesteros hit a drive during an exhibition match in 1983. This attempt at glamour by association seems unnecessary on such a wonderful golf course, though it is true that Little Island has been overshadowed in the minds of visiting golfers by the marvellous links courses on the west coast of Ireland, and even by the fancy new developments in the area, such as Old Head and Fota Island. Rest assured, however, that Cork Golf Club is still the best course in Ireland’s second city, and one of the very few parkland courses in Ireland we would take a detour to play.