The Royal Canberra Golf Course

Frank Dunshea: Recollections of Acton between 1926-1946
[Excerpts about the Royal Canberra Golf Course]

"The 7th Tee at Royal was only about one hundred yards from our back gate through a pine plantation and that is where we would usually go to get onto the course. The 9th Tee was also only a short distance from our front gate. Quite a few of the Royal members would start their rounds from the 9th Tee parking their cars just outside the boundary fence.

The Royal Canberra Golf Course at Acton was a very high standard course with good grass greens and well grassed fairways. I got to know the course fairly well in my teenage years through caddying and after I started working I often played the course with mates Ron Nieberding, George Newport and some others as a Green Tee player on Sunday afternoons. It was a good testing course with very long unforgiving rough beside most of the fairways.

I did a lot of caddying at the Royal. In those days players paid two shillings (20 cents) for a caddy ticket which they would give to their caddy and we would redeem that at the Pro Shop after the round and get one shilling and ninepence for it. The Caddy Master (Assistant Pro) would keep the other threepence. Most golfers would give you a tip of about one shilling after the round if they were satisfied with you. While waiting for a caddying job the boys would gather on a verandah of the Club House which was situated near the river below the Albert Hall. I believe this was the site of Sam Kaye's - later of Springbank - original house.

One of my first days at caddying I was surprised to see all of the others suddenly jump off the verandah and run down and disappear over the bank along the river. I found out why when, being the only boy there, I was given the job of caddying for a well known Canberra grazier who found fault with his caddy all the way round, blamed him if the ball was lost in the rough for not watching it properly and generally making it a miserable round and then did not give any tip. After being caught a few times I learnt to recognise his car arriving and cleared out to the river with the boys leaving some other newcomer to the job. There were a couple of other unpopular golfers that gave no tip or just a threepenny tip but most of the golfers were generous and good to work for. The Easter Tournament was a good time to caddy with the Pros and top amateurs coming from interstate. I caddied for some good Pros - Billy Smith from Melbourne and Sam Richardson former NSW Open Champion and saw top golfers play there such as Norman Von Nida, Eric Cremin, Frank Phillips and Kel Nagle."