Golf Balls Article
History Of The Golf Ball
When we think of or look at a golf ball, we see a small hard ball with dimples that looks like it is made of hard plastic. We hit it and we watch it go. We give little thought to the history of the golf ball. Little do we know how many changes this little ball has gone through to get to be what it is today.
The history of the golf ball began in Scotland over 300 years ago. The first golf ball was made of wood. The wood was believed to be select varieties of hardwood. The clubs were also made of wood, which no doubt made the game quite slow and tedious. As easy as they were to make, they were not very efficient because they would only travel around 100 yards.
Despite the downfalls, the wooden balls were around for over a hundred years. In the 17th century, a few Scottish scientists invented the "featherie" ball. This ball was made of boiled chicken and goose feathers with the notion that if feathers made birds fly, they may help balls to fly as well. The outside was made of cowhide, stitched shut and then stuffed with feathers.
The leather would stretch when wet so it was easy to mold and shape into a hard ball. They then painted the ball to give it a smoother finish and nice appearance. The result was a ball that flew for over 200 yards. The negative was that the balls were so time consuming to make and that made them expensive.
In the 1800s, Rev. Dr. Robert Adams added another advance to the history of the golf ball with the invention of the gutta percha ball or "gutta." Gutta percha is the liquid sap or latex from the Sapodilla tree. They would heat the sap, which made it easy to mold, and roll it on a board into the shapes they wanted.
They realized that as irregular as they were, they flew further and straighter than the featherie. They pounded them with a hammer to make indentations in them. These were called the hand hammered gutta. These golf balls were water resistant and very easy to make which made them very affordable and popular.
The Bramble design came from the gutta percha ball. The difference was that they were able to put them on a press, make designs on the ball, make them more symmetrical which improved their flight even more. The designs resembled a brambleberry, which is how the name came about.
The invention of the rubber ball by Coburn Haskell brought another addition to the history of the golf ball and changed the game of golf in ways no one could imagine. They started with a solid rubber core, tied it with high-pressure rubber thread and finished it off with a gutta percha cover, which later changed to the Balata cover. To this ever-popular ball, they added the dimples to make it the superb golf ball of today.
The golf balls we use today have cores of titanium and consist of two, three or four layers of synthetic materials. Certain specifications must be met in reference to weight and size depending on how and where the ball will be used. No other sport has had as many advances in technology as the golf ball. There has truly much evolution in the history of the golf ball.
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Read more...Source: http://aboutgolfnet.com/balls/permalink.php?article=History+Of+The+Golf+Ball.txt
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