A Brief Introduction to the Senior Golfers' Society
The Society was formed in 1926, following a goodwill visit by members of the US, and also the Canadian, Senior Golfers Associations. Currently, the Society comprises over 1,000 members from in excess of 100 golf clubs throughout the UK.
Our American and Canadian friends came hoping to arrange regular visits to the UK and suggested that we form a Society similar to those they had established a few years earlier. The first such visit (now formalised as the Triangular Match) was held at Sunningdale in 1927 and subsequent “Triangulars” have taken place regularly ever since. The Society has a rich history as do the Triangular Matches, the last having been played at Bandon Dunes, Oregon in 2023 with the next due in Ontario in 2025.
Since the formation,the Society has grown steadily and now plays over 140 matches each year in the UK against Clubs and Societies. A full list of these can be found here. Over the years, visits by Society members to other countries in Europe and the Commonwealth have resulted in similar Societies being formed there and frequent Tours being arranged . Most recently, we visited Belgium, Germany and Canada in 2024 and are due to visit South Africa in 2025. We hosted Seniors from Holland in 2024 and the Belgians will be here in 2025. A list of all our international connections is available here.
The list of past and present members includes many distinguished golfers who have achieved success on the Links. One such is John Beharrell , the Society Captain in 2006, who fifty years before at the age of 18, was the youngest ever to win the Amateur Championship. The Pathe video of this achievement can be seen here.
The Society matches usually take the form of morning foursomes, followed by lunch and afternoon foursomes, hopefully playing with a different partner against a different opposition pair. The Society believes that foursomes is the finest form of golf known to man, a notion based primarily on speed of play, teamwork and opportunity for friendly discourse with the opposition.
Matches played away from major towns are often linked into mini tours, an example being the tour to Lancashire comprising a week of golf starting at Royal Lytham, and then playing Royal Birkdale and Formby on the way to Royal Liverpool.
Our Centenary will be celebrated in 2027 with special matches against Rye, Royal Lytham and West Hill Golf Clubs who hosted our first three Club visits in 1927.
Membership of the Society is by invitation only and a candidate must be between the ages of 55 and 64 to be eligible for entry into the Candidate Book.
