Eddie Hackett (1910–1996)^[1] was an Irish golf course architect. Eddie Hackett was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1910. As a boy he suffered from tuberculosis, the effects of which left him without the strength or stamina to play active sports. He began playing golf with his father, and as a teenager got a job at his home club Royal Dublin Golf Club. By the 1930s, he had worked his way up as a golf professional, making clubs and competing in tournaments. In 1939, he became the head golf professional at Portmarnock Golf Club.^[1]

Design philosophy

Unlike the better-known of Hackett's contemporary golf course architects like Pete Dye and Robert Trent Jones, who commonly move tons of soil to create their courses, Hackett worked like the architects of a bygone era, laying out a course on the land as he found it.^[2] As Hackett said himself, "I find that nature is the best architect . . . I try to dress up what the Good Lord provides".^[3]

While his designs show his appreciation of the classic Scottish links where he refined his game, his own designs rarely include the forced carries or the blind shots sometimes found on older links such as Carnoustie or Royal Troon.

The majority of Hackett's courses are true links courses, defined by having been built on rolling, sandy ground adjacent to the sea, with native fescue grasses and few if any trees. This "linksland" (a word comes from the Old English 'hlinc' = rising ground) is ill-suited for farming or commercial use, and it was on linksland that the game of golf was developed over 500 years. Hackett also designed or revised a handful of parkland courses (inland, built on soil and frequently wooded).

Courses

Below is a partial list of courses which Eddie Hackett designed or modified.

(* Modified existing design)

Further reading

• Armstrong, Robert (2007). Golfing in Ireland, 3rd Edition. Pelican Publishing Company.

References