AS SOMEONE WHO comes from money—I was born with a silver brassie in my golf bag—it’s no problem for me to tell you whether a country club is Old Money or New Money.
In fact, I’m often asked to explain the difference. The people who ask are usually public-course hackers I stop to chat with when I find them standing by the side of the road staring at the overheating radiators in their old Plymouths.
They are quick to recognize that I’m a country club guy—my golf shirt isn’t faded.
One of the first things they ask is if my private club has good food. Like, you know, Fritos, Cheetos, Oreos, Moon Pies, Dr Pepper.
This is where I take time to explain that there are two kinds of country clubs. There’s mine, which has age, and there is the other one, where every man plays golf in short pants, dainty anklets, and a cell phone.
The golf courses are distinctly different.
Old Money is 6,200 yards, par 76, with fourteen blind shots. The front nine is in New York, the back nine in Connecticut. It was designed by Alister Donald Blair-Tilly, who routed it on a tablecloth the night he arrived in town, which was a month after he was rescued from the Titanic.
New Money is 7,800 yards, par 70, and was designed by Frank (Dog) Legg, who once drove tractors for Pete Dye and Tom Fazio. It weaves around a deep, man-made rock quarry. A stretch of three holes is laid out along the shores of a newly discovered Great Lake. Other holes demand long carries over vast regions of sand where the occasional Bedouin warrior may be sighted.
Old Money’s clubhouse looks like a combination of Manderley before the fire and Twelve Oaks before Ashley Wilkes went off to fight in the War of Northern Aggression.
New Money’s clubhouse looks like the world’s largest Taco Bell. It includes guest suites and an indoor beach volleyball court for tall young mistresses, and the Meditation Temple leads directly to the windsurfing cove and Formula One track.
Old Money’s most famous hole is the short 12th, the “Swinging Casket.” At twilight the member can stand on the 12th tee and gaze wistfully at the green light on the end of Daisy’s dock.
New Money’s favorite hole is the incredibly long 15th because it allows the member plenty of time between shots to check his text messages and make calls to say, “I’m shorting Italy.”
Old Money’s oldest member is still supported by the money he inherited from his great-grandfather who invented the washing machine, the electric toaster, and the ice cube.
You are not allowed to join Old Money if you’ve ever held a job.
New Money’s oldest member invented the hedge fund.
The wife of Old Money’s oldest member, Merger, is an elegant, gray-haired lady who as a young girl once sat on the lap of both Churchill and Hitler.
The wife of New Money’s newest member, Georgette, is twenty-seven and currently involved in redecorating their second homes in Aspen, Zurich, London, Beverly Hills, and Prague.
One of Old Money’s most popular members, Three-Hyphen Pembroke, died recently but is survived by his popular fifth wife, the sixty-one-year-old Babs, a former receptionist, who has been rebuilt to resemble a Playboy centerfold, and will continue to resemble a Playboy centerfold unless she coughs, sneezes, or smiles, in which case she will turn into Quasimodo and spend the rest of her life clinging to a gargoyle.
Most of the members at Old Money play with a set of autographed Bobby Cruickshank woods and a set of autographed Wiffy Cox irons. Their choice of a golf ball is the Spalding Kro-Flite or the bramble White Flyer.
The latest fancy of New Money members is the USS Nimitz driver, the Boeing 367 spoon, and a set of Exxon irons powered by compressed natural gas.
Old Money members putt with a rusted Wright & Dixon blade.
New Money members putt with what appears to be a tenor saxophone attached to the end of a drain pipe.
Old Money members never wear wristwatches—they don’t have to be anywhere or do anything.
A New Money member’s bulging gold Rolex lost time momentarily the other day and caused a brownout in a major American city.
Old Money members don’t really follow the PGA Tour, but most of them are certain that Denny Shute could give this chap Rory McIlroy two up a side.
New Money’s members don’t follow the PGA Tour either, but a couple of them have heard of Rory McIlroy and would like to interest him in an investment opportunity.
Old Money will always have money.
Three members at New Money are in the process of asking the Federal Reserve for a free drop from an unplayable lie.