USGA Museum - Museum History

Museum History

The origins of the USGA Museum can be traced to 1935, when George Blossom, a member of the USGA’s Executive Committee, first proposed the creation of a collection of historical golf artifacts. One year later, in an effort to formalize the Museum, the USGA Museum and Library Committee was created with the primary function of collecting historically significant artifacts and books. The first significant donation to the Museum – Bobby Jones’ legendary putter, Calamity Jane II – followed in 1938.

For the first 16 years of its existence, the Museum had no formal home and artifacts were displayed throughout the USGA offices in New York. In 1951, when the Association purchased the property at 40 East 38th Street in New York City, the first dedicated display space for the collections was created and the Museum was formally opened. Since 1972, the USGA’s headquarters in Far Hills, New Jersey, has provided public exhibition galleries, staff offices and collections storage for the Museum. The Museum is housed in a building designed in 1919 by John Russell Pope, a noted architect who also designed the National Archives Building and the Jefferson Memorial.

In 2005, the Museum was closed for a three-year renovation and expansion project. The Museum, which re-opened June 3, 2008, now includes the Arnold Palmer Center for Golf History, which provides 16,000 square feet (1,500 m2) of additional space, with more than 5,000 square feet (460 m2) of new exhibition galleries, a research center and technologically advanced storage rooms.