Lake Tahoe Sue

Let’s get more fun in this website. I hope to gather stories and photos of the lake and the fun people who have enjoyed life here. I look forward to adding your great stories, so pass them on!!

Here is an  article published in the Reno Gazette Journal in August 2009 that you might enjoy!!

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KINGS BEACH — The fairways of Old Brockway Golf Course might not be as hallowed as the Old Course at St. Andrews, yet the footprints history left behind are as plentiful as the Jeffrey Pines that line them.

Bob Hope hit his best golf shot here. Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and the rest of the Rat Pack were regulars. Charlie Chaplin, Judy Garland and Lucille Ball graced these fairways.

Even presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy played this nine-hole, par 36 course near the shores of Lake Tahoe.

But the most memorable chapter from Old Brockway’s storied past involves Bing Crosby. The club’s scorecard alludes to it. “Home of the first Crosby” it says.

Yes, that Crosby, as in the Crosby Clambake, the famous PGA event known today as the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro-Am, where celebrities are paired with professionals.

Old Brockway just last month celebrated the 75th anniversary of “the first Crosby,” staged in the summer of 1934, though without the professionals.

“Bing Crosby used to entertain at the Cal Neva (a mile away) when he was first starting out in his career,” Old Brockway owner Lane Lewis said. “He’d entertain in the evening at the Cal Neva, and he invited all of his cronies up for the week and they had a golf tournament.”

The annual tournament got so big, Lewis said, that Crosby decided to relocate it to Rancho Santa Fe, Calif., near his home and the Del Mar Race Track, in which he held a financial interest.

Alas, this bit of history is thin on details. According to the official timeline of the Crosby tournament, Crosby came up with the concept of mixing professionals and amateurs after joining Lakeside Golf Club in Los Angeles in the mid-1930s.

Crosby wanted to give Lakeside members and other low handicappers a chance to play with 50 or 60 professionals, who were on the West Coast during the winter.

Officially, the first Crosby was in 1937 at Rancho Santa Fe. Sam Snead won the rain-shortened event, after which Crosby hosted a barbecue at his home on the course.

But clearly, the roots of a celebrity-pro event were planted on the fairways of Old Brockway during Crosby’s initial tournaments in 1934 and ‘35, and possibly ‘36, though no records are available for that year.

Bob Anderson, 83, of Kings Beach started playing Old Brockway at age 10 around the time of Crosby’s events. He vaguely remembers a group of celebrities teeing off on No.. 3, but like the red stripe on range balls, memories are faded.

Nathaniel Crosby, Bing’s son, is familiar with Old Brockway but doesn’t recall his father telling him any stories about it. Told the tournaments were more or less social gatherings, Nathaniel said by phone, “That’s kind of what the first Crosby was in Rancho Santa Fe, but it did have PGA pros, it was an official PGA tournament.”

More information on Crosby’s unofficial events and other Old Brockway history went up in smoke when the Brockway Hotel burned down around 1960. Fortunately, the word-of-mouth stories, like the course, live on. Lewis, course owner since 1993, has heard a few:

(INSERT BULLET) Bob Hope’s best shot of his golfing career came at No. 2 when hitting his second shot. The ball hit the rear end of a deer grazing by the green, caromed onto the green and into the hole.

(INSERT BULLET) Holes 1, 2, 3, 8, 9 are called the Whiskey Loop after Dean Martin, who by the third hole had to start heading back to the clubhouse for another shot.

(INSERT BULLET) Lucille Ball was said to have been talked out of radio and into a TV show by a producer while playing a round at Old Brockway in circa 1950. Dare we say “I Love Lucy” was born here?

Today, the rich and famous still visit Old Brockway. Condoleezza Rice played a few weeks ago.

Oh, one more thing about Old Brockway and golf history: Golfers can step back into time and play the course the way golf was played in the 1930s. Hickory clubs can be rented for $25 with the gutta-percha golf balls (which are created from the sap of trees) provided.

One can only imagine, however, being a part of Crosby’s tournament.