The Floating Clubhouse

Every clubhouse seems to have its claim to fame: oldest this, first that, so-and-so did such-and-such thing. But no other clubhouse in the centuries-old history of golf can say it actively participated in World War I. Or that it presided over a course sitting on a spit of land that would be the setting for a near-nuclear war. Or that it floated.

Such was the case for the clubhouse at the golf course on Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. Or, rather, clubhouses. Founded in March 1915 under the leadership of Admiral Frank Friday Fletcher, commander of the U.S. Navy’s Atlantic Fleet, the course was originally named Culgoa Links, after the USS Culgoa. It was originally designed by the Culgoa’s captain, and the clubhouse was, well, the ship. And when the Culgoa, a supply vessel, was called into action, the next boat to come into port would become the course’s new clubhouse.

Admiral Fletcher, who was awarded the Medal of Honor for his actions in 1914’s Battle of Veracruz in Mexico, had firsthand experience with the effects of firefights on people. Between that and the often extensive time between missions, the seamen needed productive recreation to help pass the days. At this point, Guantánamo was strategically valuable due to its location on the map, but it wasn’t much more than an uninhabited tropical beach. As such, the Navy had to build whatever it needed. So, in addition to ball fields, tennis courts and target ranges, Fletcher ordered the establishment of a nine-hole seaside course, where each hole was played in full view of the bay’s whitecaps.

At no point could Culgoa Links be lauded for its grandeur or architectural quality. It was simple and often muddy, but, as Navy surgeon G.F. Freeman wrote in a 1915 article in The American Golfer, “I think they have more real enjoyment from the game than those who must have high class links all the time.”

Located on the southwest side of the bay, known as Hicacal Beach or, in naval terms, the “High Cackle” side, the layout wound through marshes and native mangrove swamps and could stretch to 3,500 yards, with a par of 42. Smooth areas were deemed green sites and played comparably to the sand greens of the era.

The ground, primarily clay, played differently depending on the weather. When it was hot and dry, drives would roll for what felt like forever, while the wet season would slow the game considerably. Fairways ran on flats that could be up to 60 yards wide, but thorn-ridden thickets meant there was no playing out of whatever constituted rough. “As in all golf links with similar conditions,” Freeman wrote, “the golf balls are much attracted by these thickets.”

Local rules were quickly established: Players could lift their balls out of the rough with the loss of a stroke; when the ground was soft and the ball rolled into a footprint, players got a free drop.

Despite its vast differences from modern courses, players determined their own tee boxes depending on the match or level of skill. This is the same philosophy now employed at new clubs like Ohoopee. And while the course at Guantánamo is long gone, Freeman beautifully noted the thread it shares with every course then, now and in the future: “These links are natural and the golf is more like golf in the early days when it was played in a field or across country, but the spirit and the game are the same.”

Connor T. Lewis leads the Society of Golf Historians. He has been a Broken Tee Society member since 2020.