Con decided we should find a local course where I could practice without all the stress of a high volume course. We found Scotch Hills Country Club, a lovely nine hole public course with a very interesting history.The clubhouse, originally the Ephraim Tucker Farmhouse built in the mid-1700’s, became the George Osbourne tavern in 1897. (I knew there was a reason Con was drawn to it). In 1900 the farmland was converted into a nine-hole golf course and the farmhouse into a clubhouse.
In 1921, a group of prominent black investors purchased the property and formed the first African-American owned and operated country club in the United States. The Club became a center of African American society at the time hosting jazz greats Count Basie, Duke Ellington, W.E.B. Du Bois, Joe Louis, Althea Gibson, and Sarah Vaughn. After a tax lien foreclosure in 1938, Scotch Plains Township acquired the property and renamed it Scotch Hills Country Club
Who would have guessed our little "practice" course had so much history?
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