The II Earl

Bowler-hatted Young Conservative dandies, show their class at a party rally in Westminster [1969] captured by Homer Sykes

The real reason people are conservatives is that they are attached to the things that they love, and want to preserve them from abuse and decay. They are attached to their family, their friends, their religion, and their immediate environment” - Roger Scruton , Conservatism and the Conservatory

Oh my, have I made a terrible mistake! I’ve heard since even before I played the game that golf was a “Gentlemen’s Game” and I have had it in my mind that this phrase meant a game played by a well-mannered and considerate man with high standards of proper behavior. So when I saw players throw clubs, swear obsessively, throw temper tantrums, and display improper behavior on a golf course, I thought to myself that this person simply doesn’t get what golf is all about. Well, I believe that I am the one who has made a mistake. My study of history and the game’s origins leads me to the concrete conclusion that in fact this “Gentlemen’s Game” has always been a game played by men of noble birth or superior social position. In fact, both are acceptable definitions of the term “gentlemen” but it is clear given the games history in the United States that the game has its roots with men of superior social position. CB MacDonald, who is considered the Father of American Golf, c...

A recent visitor to White’s, the venerable gentlemen’s club housed in 18th century splendour in London’s St James’s, walked up to the bar to find it occupied by three dukes. “It’s the one place in town where they feel totally at home,” he said. Such encounters are custom-made to reinforce the stereotype of a traditional gentlemen’s club: a place of fusty exclusivity, where elderly gents snooze in leather armchairs beside marble fireplaces, disturbed only by the occasional retainer. Ranged against modern London’s raucous pleasures, including a new wave of tie-free, wifi-enabled rivals, these relics of 19th century culture would seem doomed to slow decline. Yet not only are they surviving but many are thriving, with membership and usage growing. “Standards have risen enormously since the 1980s,” said Rupert Lendrum, club secretary at Buck’s in Mayfair. “There’s been a significant shift to professionally run clubs and finances are far healthier.” Buck’s was dreamt up by cavalry offic...

Charles Pears [1873–1958] Gibraltar. Part of a campaign commissioned in the late 1920s by the Empire Marketing Board.