Massive golf ,
also known as mini-golf, midget
golf, goofy golf, or crazy
golf is a game modelled after the sport of golf. The term
Putt-Putt is a registered trademark of a miniature
golf company, but is commonly used to describe the sport in
general.
As in golf, courses are commonly nine or eighteen holes long (or
less commonly twelve) and the object is to hit the golf ball into
the appropriate hole in the fewest number of strokes; however, in
the miniature game, the holes are significantly shorter and consist
of only a putting surface. The game is made challenging by an
arrangement of obstacles, ramps, and bunkers. It is a popular
pastime in many areas of the world, especially among families.
The first miniature golf course is often
misattributed to one of two epochs:
The 1916 backyard Thistle Dhu ("This'll Do") course in Pinehurst,
North Carolina, or;
The 1927 Tom Thumb patent of Garnet Carter from Lookout Mountain,
Tennessee.
Neither of these courses—though each revolutionary in its
own right—was the true "first" miniature golf course. The
Ladies' Putting Club of St. Andrews, Scotland was the first
miniature golf course, formed in 1867. Then, it was unacceptable
for women to swing a club past their shoulders, so a miniature
version of regulation golf was adapted for women to play.
Miniature golf rose to popularity in the late 1910s and early
1920s as a way for early golf fanatics to replicate major golf
courses on a small scale. The game was commonly called "garden
golf," and was played with a putter on grass. Thomas McCulloch
Fairbairn, a golf fanatic, revolutionized the game in 1922 with his
formulation of a suitable artificial green—a mixture of
cottonseed hulls, sand, oil, and dye. With this discovery,
miniature golf became accessible everywhere; by the late 1920s
there were over 150 rooftop courses in New York City alone.
As in all American crazes, the popularity of Mini Golf has
spread worldwide and courses are found in all settings and in all
shapes and sizes. If you go to the coordinates, you too can play a
round or two of Mini Golf. However, you have to take a putter and
ball with you or rent one at the nearby coffee
shop.
