LBGC Centenary Book - Flipbook - Page 23
Langland Centenary Book
15/2/05
6:08 pm
Page 23
One of the early war-inspired actions of the Board was to have
the Club’s collection of cups properly insured and for safety
reasons they were removed to a strong room at Greig
Simpson’s works, where they were promptly destroyed by
enemy action. For many years after, trophy winners were
rewarded with a voucher and a photograph of the trophy they
had won! Most of the competitions continued to be played for
during the war despite the shortage of both golf balls and
players.The shortage of golf balls was kept from crisis
proportions by the work of a most amiable eccentric member,
the late D.O.Thomas.
D.O., a well known Swansea Solicitor, was a much loved
character in the Club. A left-handed golfer of indifferent ability
- he was wont to gamble one farthing per hole, and never in
his playing days exceeded this. Usually wearing a bowler hat,
and even garbed in shirt sleeves and trousers supported by
canvas bracers, and accompanied by a nondescript dog by the
name of “Timoshenko”, he spent untold hours rooting in
hedges and bushes finding balls and returning them to their
owners. Or indeed to anyone who was unable to play due to a
ball famine. He served on the Board for a number of years and
was a leading light in the two abortive attempts made by
members to establish a piggery on a little used part of the
course. D.O.’s daughter, Mrs. Hazel Harris, is our Centenary
Ladies Captain and has played a major part in administration at
Club and County level. More of Hazel later in the book.
Another member prominent in those war years was George
Shellard, a very fine golfer and an indefatigable worker on and
off the course. George dealt with all the land problems of the
Club, which were many, for apart from the various Agricultural
Committees who had to be dealt with, the Admiralty had
requisitioned certain parts of the course. George was Captain
in 1943 and again in 1944 until he was called up in that year
and was in 1974 our Captain again. Incidentally, George was in
1943 the second youngest Captain the Club has had.
It was during the war that the Club’s Honorary Solicitor died.
Mr. C.W. Slater had been a prominent member for some years
and had dealt with the formation of the Company. Ben WalkerJones was appointed Honorary Solicitor in his place; an office
he retained for many years.
The late Charles Mortimer had always been in charge of the
bar since its inception and in his capacity as manager of
Hancocks Brewery he saw to it that the Club was able to
obtain a fair share of whatever supplies were available.
Unfortunately some members took advantage of this and used
Annual Dinner Dance at The Langland Bay Hotel - Late 40’s
to bring a number of visitors with them to the Clubhouse.This
led to a ban being placed on non-playing visitors, a rather
arbitrary rule which caused much ill-feeling, especially to
servicemen home on leave who were asked to remove
themselves from the Clubhouse when having a drink with
parents or wives who were full members. So many complaints
were made to the Board that the rule was amended several
times and eventually allowed to lapse.
The finances of the Club were improving as due to licences
and various restrictions no maintenance could be carried out
on the buildings. Consequently at the end of the war the Club
had some £2000 invested in Government securities, a position
it had never been in before, or since.
The membership in May 1945 comprised:Ordinary Male members
144
Ordinary Female members
56
Junior members
5
Country members
6
Non-playing members
56
Total 267
It would appear that these numbers included all those
members whose subscriptions had been held in abeyance when
they joined the Armed Forces. If this is the case then four of
the five junior members no longer qualified as juniors, all being
about twenty-two years of age.They were Peter Benson who
had been the Club Champion at the age of fifteen in 1939, H.L.
“Twt’s” Parry, Hedley Watkin Jones and David Billings.The fifth
junior was probably John Parry, ‘twt’s brother.
It was expected that congestion would again be rampant when
members returned from the forces, and in order to reduce this
it was decided to limit playing membership to 200 with the
discretion to increase this to 225, and in view of the continuing
shortage of bar supplies to limit non-playing members to 75.
These limits were, however, soon to be rescinded without
causing too much congestion because of the post-war boom in
the Club membership.
At the close of the second phase of the golfing activities at
Langland Bay, we had a limited company with a comparatively
large amount of liquid funds, about ten years to run on a lease
of one of the most beautiful areas in the country and with
buildings which, to say the least, were in a very poor state of
repair. Not, perhaps the best launching pad to rise to the
heights we now enjoy.
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