8/9/2012:
Golf was in the air on this date in 1933, as the golf course in Belfield was under repair, and the golf club, which had recently started up again, needed more members to help cover the expenses. The secretary of the club tried to get a Scottish friend to become a member. The man said he would be happy to join, but he had lost his golf ball on the course in Beach some six years prior. He claimed he would join if someone found the ball. The Belfield Review newspaper published this item, and the club began the search. It didn’t take long, though, and by the next week, the newspaper had received a package from Beach, containing a golf ball, and this letter:
“Dear Sir;
It is my pleasure to restore this Scotchman’s long lost bail. Tell him that it pays to advertise, but that he should have done it sooner.”
It was signed “The Finder.”
The Belfield Review, pleased with the speed at which their little blurb had led to the return of the golf ball, thanked the Finder…though the condition of the ball may not have been the best, after six years. The newspaper commented that “A golf ball is a little thing. It is round and hard and mostly white. That is most of the time, but like other things they get old, dirty, scratched, and marred. In the course of six years a golf ball has done remarkable well to stand up under the strain, unless of course it has been laid aside or lost.”
The ball was returned to its owner, and so was the message, but in this case, there was no payment, as the newspaper, tongue firmly in cheek, noted:
“True to the Scotchman’s instinct, though, when we told him what it would cost for the advertisement, he said, ‘That was no ad, that was on the front page.’ And as we did not want to see him lose out on the golf nor the club lose the membership fee, we turned the ball over to him, and expect to see him get some mighty good use out of it, even though it is six years old.”
Dakota Datebook written by Sarah Walker
Sources:
The Belfield Review, August 11, 1933, p1
The Belfield Review, August 18, 1933, p1