06/01/2026
FENWICK GOLF, A MINI-HISTORY
The first official golf club was founded in Scotland in 1744, but golf was played hundreds of years before in various forms. By the mid-1800s, Scottish players began using the newly invented gutta-percha ball, a ball of compressed latex. It replaced the feathery, a compressed boiled-feather mixture covered in leather and painted white. Unfortunately, featheries were very expensive and easily damaged by exposure to water and the impact of the golf club. When gutties replaced featheries, the cost of equipment was greatly reduced and golf’s popularity increased dramatically. The sport quickly spread to America where numerous clubs were being established in the 1880s and 90s.
At that time, golf was already a summer sport in Fenwick. It started with summer vacationers playing on the large, treeless grass fields which were the unsold lots surrounding the aging Fenwick Hall Hotel. By 1896, the number of golf holes had expanded to nine, with the help of Morgan Gardner Bulkeley and his neighbors. It is now the oldest public golf course in the state. In the late 1890s, Morgan G. Bulkeley was building his seaside Fenwick summer cottage. He was the former mayor of Hartford, former governor of Connecticut and soon to be the US senator from Connecticut. He was also the president of Hartford’s Aetna Life Insurance Company, and the architect of the Borough of Fenwick, incorporated in 1899. Luckily for Fenwick, he was also an enthusiastic golfer.
Until his death this year in 2026, his grandson Peter Bulkeley was the de facto Fenwick golf historian. His book, The Morgan Cup, chronicles the history of both the Fenwick golf course and The Morgan Cup, Fenwick’s annual 125-year-old golf tournament. The book is filled with Peter’s rich Fenwick golf memories. Here are just a few.
“It was Dr. William D. Morgan, a prominent physician in Hartford, and the first cousin of the legendary J.P. Morgan, who in 1900, offered a trophy (Now the Morgan Cup) to be played for by his Fenwick friends.”
“The Goodwin family were Protestant Episcopalians and the Bulkeley-Brainard family were strong Congregationalists. One reason that over time most Protestant Fenwick families moved closer to the Episcopalian church may have been because of their wish to enjoy a social drink. Congregationalists of the 1890s opposed any drinking of alcoholic beverages and the playing of golf on the sabbath. Celebratory drinking became part of the Morgan Cup tradition and at the September 1900 invitational it was not hard to imagine that the bar at Fenwick Hall was doing a very brisk business.”
“On the hotel road (Today’s 5th hole) where the road crossed the fairway there was an old Fenwick lamppost right in the middle of the fairway. The long hitters always tried to knock out the glass globe on the light. No one ever did.”
“Until the late 1970s the course was still primitive because we had no watering system. In 1972, as the Park Commissioner, I recommended a watering system be put on the tees and greens. The recommendation was turned down so I resigned. But my resignation so shocked the Board that the next year the watering system was installed. In 1995 the system was upgraded to include the approach and fringe areas of the greens.”
“In 1979 the golf holes were renumbered, and a new parking lot was built next to the Borough buildings across Maple Avenue. That eliminated 25 to 75 cars a day from entering and leaving Fenwick. Previously, the cars caused a dust bowl by parking at the old first tee.” (Next to the Fenwick Hall Hotel)
“Prior to 1962 golf carts were unknown in Fenwick. But in 1962 the Borough Warden, Houghton Bulkeley, (Peter Bulkeley’s father) developed a bad hip. He bought a bright red Cushman golf cart and was needled mercilessly by his playing partners. But then Clayton Gengras bought one, and that took the heat off. Golf carts were added.”
“There are those that suggest the origin of the word GOLF comes from Gentlemen Only Ladies Forbidden. But this was never so in Fenwick. The growing popularity of golf among men did restrict the access of women but women were also severely constricted by the fashions of the time. They mandated women be properly attired in graceful ankle-length skirts, tightly fitted corsets, wide brimmed straw hats, and starched blouses with long sleeves. Full-fingered gloves were also worn on both hands. Shoes were of leather high-button design which further restricted movement required to hit the ball properly. Nevertheless, Fenwick women’s golf grew and grew rapidly.”
“In the 1940s caddies were available to tote bags. They were mostly from Saybrook Point but also Fenwick. The caddies hung around the old pump house of the Fenwick Hall hotel which was just 30 yards north of the old first tee. Residents would pay an Old Saybrook caddie 40 cents for 9 holes, but a Fenwick boy usually only got 25 cents, more if he was really good.”
“In 1945, at a 7PM news conference, President Truman announced the war was over. I had been the bell ringer at St.-Mary’s-by-the Sea during the war years so it was my assignment to then unlock the chapel and toll the bells, which I did very enthusiastically for about 10 minutes. Everyone in Fenwick came to the chapel to pray and give thanks to their god that the war was over. The younger generation that summer evening went over to town to celebrate at the carnival which had come to town.”
Peter Bukeley played in 75 consecutive Morgan Cups, a record. On his 39th try in 1983, Peter won. His son Jonathan won in 1984, the first time a son won the year after his father. In 2021, his 9th decade playing for the cup, he was 90 years old and shot an 84!
Peter died in March of this year, he was 94. He was a lifetime member of the Old Saybrook Historical Society and a good friend who is genuinely missed.
