User:WhaleyTim/Sandbox : USA Golf

United States of America
Evidence of early golf in what is now the United States includes a 1739 record for a shipment of golf equipment to a William Wallace in Charleston, South Carolina, an advertisement published in the Royal Gazette of New York City in 1779 for golf clubs and balls, and the establishment of the South Carolina Golf Club in 1787 in Charleston. However, as in England, it was not until the late 19th century that golf started to become firmly established.

Several clubs established in the 1880s can make claim to be the oldest extant in the country, but what is not disputed is that as a result of two competing "National Amateur Championships" being played in 1894, delegates from the Newport Country Club, Saint Andrew's Golf Club, Yonkers, New York, The Country Club, Chicago Golf Club, and Shinnecock Hills Golf Club met in New York City to form what was to become the United States Golf Association (USGA). By 1910 there were 267 clubs.

During the Roaring Twenties the game expanded greatly in popularity and by 1932 there were over 1,100 golf clubs affiliated to the USGA. In 1922 Walter Hagen became the first native born American to win the British Open Championship, signaling the USA's dominance of the game that has yet to be seriously challenged. The expansion of the game was halted by the Great Depression and World War II, but continued in the post war years. By 1980 there were over 5,908 USGA affiliated clubs. That figure grew to over 10,600 by 2013.