Mungo Park is the grandson of Willie Park who won the British Open for the first time in 1860.

Jul, 2023

HOYLAKE (England) — Dustin Raymond, an avid golf memorabilia collector, was looking online for hidden treasures when he stumbled upon an auction of antique golf photographs dating back to the 1800s.

He looked through the books and found that most of them were copies, but only a few were originals.

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He thought “Holy Cow!” “That’s a Willie Park original.”

He bought the collection of 100 photos by clicking “buy it now”. He remembers thinking “These don’t belong to me” when they arrived.

He posted the photos to the Golf Historian Society website, where a member suggested that he contact Mungo Park. Mungo Park is the great grandson Willie Park Sr. who won the Claret Jug and the first British Open among his four titles in 1860. His great-granduncle Mungo Park was the Claret Jug winner in 1874. The photo Raymond purchased was indeed rare, but was actually of Mungo Park Sr. and not Willie Park Sr.

Park said, “We know about six photos of him including this one which we have never seen before.”

He recognized the handwriting on the backs of the photographs as belonging to a distant cousin. Park was so grateful to Raymond for returning the photos to his family that he asked him what he could repay him. Raymond wanted to have a beer with him and meet at the 151 st open. Park and Raymond met at the Royal Liverpool Golf Club during the first round on Thursday. They were only connected by an old photo. Yours truly took some new pictures and sat in the horseshoe-shaped grandstand around the 18 thhole with Park.

Mungo Park, Sr. was the winner of 1874 British Open. (Courtesy Dustin Raymond).

Park is one of golf’s great names – Mungo must be better than Tiger Woods. Mungo has been working on his golf book for nearly eight years. It is about Musselburgh’s history and the Park family, who have played a major role in its reputation. Mungo believes that the town should be known as the ‘Cradle of Golf’. This was his only Open win. Willie Park Jr. also won two titles in 1887 and 1889, both at Prestwick. Mungo wrote, in 2011, in an issue Through The Green, the journal for the British Golf Collectors Society that his great uncle “never quite lived up to his early promise”. He, like his brother, his nephew and others, turned to consulting on the construction and design of golf courses and teaching the game. He embarked on the peripatetic and sometimes precarious life of professional golf ‘architect/greenkeeper.'” In the census of 1901, Mungo Sr. was registered as a patient at Inveresk Poorhouse, and he died there in 1904.

Dustin Raymond (right) purchased a rare photo of Mungo Sr. and returned it back to a family member Mungo park (left), named after him. They met in the first round of the 2023 British Open, at Royal Liverpool. (Adam Schupak/Golfweek)

Mungo pointed out a tenuous connection between his family history and that of the Open in Hoylake. Jose Jurado was Roberto de Vicenzo’s mentor, and he was the one who welcomed him back to Argentina when he won in 1967. Jurado was the first Argentinean to compete on his own turf against Europeans and North Americans. He had won seven Argentine Opens in his career. In addition to his Abierto victories, he also finished in the top 10 of 4 majors (3 Opens, and 1 US Open). In Wikipedia, it states that he started his career as a ‘caddie at the Royal and Ancient Golf Club in St. Andrews’. This couldn’t (literally!) be further from the truth. Mungo Park Jr. wrote that he had been a caddie in Buenos Aires at the San Andres Golf Club, where he learned from my grandfather. My grandfather designed and built that course, and he had won the Abierto there in 1905. He won it again in 1907, and in 1912. Jurado was a long way behind him in 1922 when he won his first Abierto. But it must have been a great pleasure to his grandfather to see his protege’s success and career.

Robert Chambers was the architect of the nine original holes. He learned golf in Musselburgh when he was a youngster and served as captain of Musselburgh Golf Club between 1855 and 1856. He was a champion player, representing the Bruntsfield Golfing Society in the 1858 Grand National Tournament held at St. Andrews. After a decade of inactivity, he brought Musselburgh Golf Club to life, bringing it back to life before the construction of the clubhouse in 1874 and the centenary of the club. Chambers families are usually associated with St. Andrews, where R Chambers Snr lived, or North Berwick, where Robert Jnr was a member and built his grand home. However, it’s a sign of a neglected history when the strong connections that Chambers have had with Musselburgh over three generations is not mentioned.

It is fascinating to see how golf’s history is interwoven with social histories from the time.

From a previous exchange of emails between Golfweek and Mungo, here’s some more information about the name Mungo in the game and the Park family.

A rare photo of Mungo Park, winner of the 1873 British Open. (Courtesy Dustin Raymond)

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