An American loved in Scotland

The British Open is underway.

This year, the British Open is being played at St. Andrews - the birthplace of the game of golf. As I write this, after one round of play, the leader is a young man from Holywood, Northern Ireland by the name of Rory Mcllroy. Rory was born in 1989.

I remember another young man at St. Andrews. Well, I don't remember him because I'm not that old, but I have read about him because he is, by many golfer's votes, the greatest golfer to ever play the game. Bobby Jones.

Here's a trick question: how much was Bobby Jones' lifetime earnings from winning golf tournaments? Answer: nothing - Bobby was an amateur.*

Who was the last amateur to win the British Open? Bet you can guess, now.

Bobby Jones won golf's grand slam at the time, 1930, by winning all 4 of the slam tournaments: the U.S. Amateur; the U.S. Open; the British Amateur; the British Open. All in the same year.

Bobby Jones retired at age 28.

A final trivia question: what was Bobby Jones' occupation? Answer: he was an attorney in Georgia.

Bobby Jones contracted a rare disease of the spinal cord that left him paralyzed and, eventually, in a wheel chair.

From the San Francisco Chronicle [July 15, 2010]: In 1958, Jones became only the second American - after Benjamin Franklin - to be honored as a Freeman of the City of St. Andrews. By then, Jones was ravaged by a rare degenerative disease. As he was wheeled from the hall, the crowd burst into the Scottish ballad, "Will ye no come back again?" Everyone wept.

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*Bobby Jones did earn money from the game of golf, as an instructor and as a course designer, but never as a player.

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See more pictures of the Royal and Ancient at A Postcard A Day.

One last try...

The main disappointment in my collection of words and cultural facts since I started this research blog a few months ago, has been the almost complete lack of information on Northern Ireland.

Since it is unlikely that any information I receive after the end of this month will have a reasonable chance of making it into my book, due to publishing deadline constraints, I want to make what will almost surely be my last appeal for information on this "missing" part of the United Kingdom.

I have no blog contributors (to my knowledge at least) who are natives of Northern Ireland (although A. was born in Ireland before the the separation of the republic, but not in Northern Ireland) so, I hope to at least glean from the rest of you some memories of visits or residencies of the past. Obviously I am hoping for information from A. as well.

While I am sad I haven't been able to find bloggers who are native to Northern Ireland, and who still live there, I am happy that I have made a friend who does live there now, and who has become familiar with this delightful place. I am even more happy that this friend, Catherine, has agreed to do what she can to help me out with Northern Ireland, starting, I think, with a post on some of their special words (slang of course!) Obviously I also hope to entice her to make some other comments over the next few days, in addition to words alone, which talk about some of her experiences of living there. I know very well how precious Catherine's "free" time is, and so anything at all from her will be appreciated.

Getting the basic Google out of the way:

"Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom and covers 14,139 km² (5,459 sq miles) in the northeast part of the island of Ireland. Northern Ireland forms about a sixth of the total area of the island of Ireland. It has a population of 1,685,000 (April 2001) which is c30% of the island's total population.

"The capital of Northern Ireland is Belfast.

"Northern Ireland was created by the Government of Ireland Act, 1920 and has had its own form of devolved government, The Northern Ireland Assembly."

Not much, but a start.

Last chance. Anyone?