niblick

Old Morris passed on his mashie niblick — an early term for a seven iron — to his equally talented son, Young Tom Morris, who won the British Open four times from 1868 to 1872.

Without the commitment of golf to saving archaic and banal objects, the “niblick” and “mashie” would be truly endangered.

He then had the humiliation of exchanging his putter for his niblick, and, we may assume without being unkind, that was the last seriously competitive round he ever played.

The others are from days of mashies and niblicks: Harry Cooper and Macdonald Smith.

The first was by Ross Somerville in the tournament’s inaugural year of 1934 when he hit a mashie niblick from 145 yards into the cup.