A broken run of Golf magazine brought a handsome return of $6000 (£4690), some 10 times the mid-estimate figure, in a May 16 sale held by PBA Galleries (20/15% buyer’s premium).
Established in 1894, this was the official bulletin of the United States Golf Association and on offer was a broken run of eight volumes from the years 1897-1908. The bindings were perished or defective, but the contents were said to be generally very good.
An even more impressive improvement on a matching $500-800 estimate was provided by a run of The Golfer’s Magazine for the years 1906-08. Smartly presented in three half morocco-bound volumes, the 36 monthly issues sold at $14,000 (£10,940).
Though believed to be the only surviving set, a complete run of the magazine Golf Illustrated & Outdoor America (1914-35) was, however, sold at a somewhat lower than expected $3500 (£2735).
A signed, limited edition first of CB MacDonald’s Scotland’s Gift: Golf of 1928, complete with slipcase but with some discolouration to the binding, was also a little disappointing at $8000 (£6250).
However, that same sum was far higher than expected for a work issued in 1938 to mark the 40th anniversary of the founding of the …Minikhada Club of Minneapolis.
The latter ran to just 24pp in printed wrappers, but one of just 130 copies of the larger, cloth-bound club history that had been issued in 1923 to mark the Minnesota club’s 25th anniversary, a work illustrated with 30 mounted photographs, was left unsold on an estimate of $6000-9000.
