Golf and Equestrian Sports
Golf and Equestrian Sports
Wealthy landowners in the 1920s enjoyed high-brow recreation like golf and equestrian sports, paying thousands of dollars each year for exclusive memberships to private clubs.
Eugene Homans, a 17-year old Englewood native who won his fourth consecutive title in the New Jersey State Junior Golf championship at the Morris County Golf Club founded in 1894 by an affluent group of women who leased 20 acres of land off of Madison Avenue and built a seven-hole course. The club hosted golf tournaments, social events, and junior sporting events for children. In the 1920s, membership certificates ran a cost of $450 per family, or $250 per individual (approximately $7,600 and $4,200 today).
The Whippany River Club was founded in 1903 on the old Eugene Higgins estate, which is now the Mennen Sports Arena, with twenty-six charter members whose combined wealth exceed $8 billion when adjusted for inflation. Club members enjoyed polo matches, steeplechase racing, coaching, tennis, racquetball and croquet. Train service to the main gate offered easy access for wealthy spectators.
Located on South Street, the Seaton Hackney stables held horse racing and trotting events. The land was purchased in 1914 by lawyer and director Judge William H. Moore, and it also featured a track that was intended to provide a more organized alternative to the illegal street races regularly held between the Morristown Green and Madison Avenue. Pictured above is Moore’s prize horse, Seaton Pippin, driven by his wife. Seaton Pippin won a total of $24,269 in championship prize money in her lifetime (well over $600,000 today).