For 16 seasons, Patrick Mannelly took on NFL opponents deploying the modern techniques his position required. On Aug. 13, he took on the Glencoe Golf Club’s 12th hole with equipment from a bygone era.
Mannelly, the retired Chicago Bears long snapper, and current part-time sports radio personality, hit a ball roughly 130 yards on the Par-3 using an old time five iron as part of the closest-to-the-pin contest.
Mannelly used the club with some curiosity, coming away pleased with the result.
“I think the excitement is seeing the club and how different it is and then hitting it,” Mannelly noted. “You hit it square, which fortunately I did, it does not feel too different. If you miss it, it is going to vibrate in your hand.”
Such was one perspective on a Friday afternoon as the Golf Club celebrated its 100th anniversary with vintage clubs and tees. Players were also afforded the opportunity to have some moonshine and a dinner with a 1920s theme.
“It’s been fun, we’ve learned a lot about the decade of our inception and we are going to have a good time celebrating with all of supporters,” Golf Club General Manager Stella Nanos said.
Also taking a swing with the old equipment was one of Mannelly’s playing partners, ESPN Chicago Radio morning host David Kaplan.
“I felt like I concentrated more because I didn’t trust the club,” Kaplan said. “But it actually felt really good; it came off the face nice. It is not a forgiving club, but if you hit it right, it goes.”
The opportunity to use the old clubs that were collected from a staff member’s private collection was just one aspect of the Golf Club’s efforts to recreate a time when Warren Harding was in the White House and Bobby Jones and Walter Hagen dominated the professional golf tour.
On the 10th hole, there was a straight drive contest using a sand tee, which was commonplace in the 1920s. A shot glass or a cone was used to pack in wet sand and the ball was placed on top.
“Back in 1921, they didn’t have tee pegs,” explained Golf Club Assistant Professional Michael Wachs. “They used sand or they used their foot to kick up a little bit of dirt. We are trying to replicate that.”
Over on the third hole, players over the age of 21 could take a single shot of a variety of different-flavored moonshines, as the outlaw beverage was often produced illegally during the Prohibition era.
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Glencoe’s Phil Brilliant sampled a blackberry concoction.
“I like it, I think they should have it every other hole,” Brilliant joked.
Another throwback touch included a 1934 three-window Ford coupe parked near the entrance.
Golf Club employee Doug Clark donned a sweater vest, bow tie and knickers.
“Halloween is my favorite holiday,” Clark quipped. “I have a tendency to get carried away at these sorts of things when asked to dress for the occasion.”
Nanos said the golf course activities led into a meal of beef Wellington, asparagus with hollandaise sauce, shrimp cocktail, a skewer with green olives and sharp cheddar as 130 diners listened to band music of the era.
“Whatever was popular in the 1920s when it first came out, that is what we have on our menu tonight,” Nanos said.
Besides the centennial celebration, the day also marked the formal launch of the Friends of the Glencoe Golf Club, an organization charged with a fundraising campaign for construction of a new clubhouse.
Before the event, Nanos said the board had already raised approximately $12,000, but she was set to announce an anonymous $125,000 matching gift and they hope to have that amount matched before the end of the calendar year.
The overall target is $5 million, Nanos said.
Nanos said the new clubhouse is set to have a restaurant, private space for parties, a conference room, an indoor/outdoor bar, croquet facilities and an event space for children-friendly games. She believes it will benefit the entire community. The renderings of the proposed clubhouse were on display.
“It is a project for the whole village of Glencoe,” Nanos said. “It is not just for golf.”
Daniel I. Dorfman is a freelance reporter.