In 1925, the British Open was staged at Prestwick for the last time. The decision by the Royal and Ancient to abandon the spiritual home of the championship had to do largely with serious crowd problems, when supporters of the Scots-born MacDonald Smith swarmed onto the fairways and disrupted play.
Ironically, the encroachment affected Smith more than his American opponent, Jim Barnes, who went on to capture the title with a score of 300. So it was that the venue which had launched the world's premier golf event in 1860 was removed from the championship rota.
Another major decision arising out of the 1925 staging was that when the event went to Royal Lytham for the first time the following year, admission charges were introduced. It was a move which would bring about one of the most extraordinary happenings in the history of sport.
By 1926, the championship had grown in popularity to such an extent that it was considered appropriate by the R and A to introduce a qualifying process. This was staged at Sunningdale where, in the opinion of his biographer, OB Keeler, Bobby Jones played the finest round of his illustrious career.
As Keeler wrote: "There have been lower scoring rounds, Bobby himself had scored better, but his card of 66 was played with a precision and a freedom from error never attained before or after by the greatest perfectionist of them all; incomparable in steadiness and execution.
"There was just one single error in the round. At the 13th hole, a one-shotter of 175 yards, Bobby's iron shot rolled into a shallow, pot bunker, from which he chipped and holed the putt. The mistake did not cost him anything, but it was a single flaw in a perfect round.
"He had no assistance from luck and needed none. He played the first nine in 33 and the last nine in 33. He had 33 putts and 33 other shots. He had neither a two to bring his score down, not a five to mar it. The course is 6,472 yards around on the card, but it was a great deal longer from some of the back tees used for this competition.
"It is especially lavish with long, two-shot holes, the toughest pars. Bobby used his mashie (five-iron) only twice and his mashie-niblick (seven-iron) once, his second shots continually requiring a full iron and occasionally a brassie. He holed only one long putt of 25 feet, and to pay for it, he missed two putts of five feet, each for birdies."
While at Sunningdale, Jones picked up a beautifully-modelled driver from the resident professional, Jack White, who named it Jeannie Deans, which is a Scottish endearment. From then on, Jones never played with any other driver in competition: indeed he used it when carding a second qualifying round of 68 at Sunningdale.
Bernard Darwin was moved to comment in the London Times: "After a reverential cheer at the final green, the crowd dispersed awe-struck, realising that they had witnessed something they had never seen before and would never see again."
We are told that the great man stayed that night at the Wheatsheaf Hotel on the edge of Windsor Park, while Lloyds slashed their odds down to an unprecedented 3 to 1 against Jones winning the championship.
When the championship eventually got under way - and we are celebrating its 75th anniversary this week - the scoring went along anticipated lines. By the halfway stage, Jones and compatriot Wild Bill Melhorn were tied for the lead on 144; Walter Hagen was a stroke back on 145 and Al Watrous was on 146.
Long as Sunningdale may have seemed, Jones never anticipated anything like Lytham's 600-yard 11th hole, played into the wind. "It was a new experience for me to bang three-wood shots as hard as I could and then have a pitch left to the green," he said later.
According to Iain Crawford in his book Royal Lytham and St Annes, the custom of the time was to play 36 holes on the final day. He wrote: "Jones and Al Watrous, the professional from Grand Rapids, Michigan, were drawn together to play at 9.18 and 1.18.
"Watrous was not as long off the tee as Jones, but he was a very steady player and a good putter, and at the 18th at the end of the morning he holed from 10 feet for a birdie to be round in 69, which put him two shots ahead of Jones."
An indication of the friendly rivalry between the pair was that, during a short break for lunch, they shared sandwiches at the Majestic Hotel.
Then, before they resumed play for the final round of the championship, it happened.
Accounts of the 1926 British Open informs us that despite the introduction of an admission charge of 2s 6d per head (12 1/2 pence in today's money), 10,623 tickets were sold, producing a gate of £1,365 of which £41 3s went in expenses. First prize was £75.
Henry Longhurst and Tom Scott shared the coverage on BBC radio, transmitting reports through post office lines at a total cost of £6 7s 6d. There were ropes, wooden fences and sign posts on the links which prompted one correspondent to remark that it looked like Haydock Park race course.
There is no record that Royal Lytham received any payment for playing host to the event, but entry to the clubhouse was by ticket only. In the event, when the gate receipts were counted at the end of the day, they included a contribution of 2s 6d from the actual championship winner.
Staggering though it may seem in the context of today's courtesy cars and general, red-carpet treatment of the game's leading players, Jones actually paid into Royal Lytham to compete in the final round. Crawford tells us: "When he (Jones) got back to the course, he found he had forgotten his player's badge and the commissionaire at the gate did not recognise him and refused to admit him to the course.
"So, without protest, Jones quietly went to the spectators' gate and paid 2s 6d to get in to win his first Open Championship in Britain!"
In the process, he played a miracle shot out of a fairway bunker on the 17th, a carry of close to 175 yards which he achieved with a mashie (five-iron) to set up a par to a three-putt bogey from Watrous. In that instant, Watrous is reported to have groaned: "There goes $100,000."
Ever mindful of his responsibilities to the golfing public, Jones later presented the mashie to Charles MacFarlane, golf writer with the London Evening News, who in turn, gave it to the Royal Lytham club where it hangs to this day.
The aftermath of the championship was almost as spectacular as the event itself. We are told that Hagen, who had boasted of being "the first golfer to make a million and the first golfer to spend it", left in an open Rolls Royce, bouncing golf balls off the road, to the delight of onlookers.
Meanwhile, as an amateur, Jones received no payment for his victory, which meant he actually departed from the event out of pocket, quite apart from his hotel and travelling expenses. But according to Keeler, there were wonderful memories.
He wrote: "It seemed that every great figure in British golf was in that big room (in the Lytham clubhouse), coming over to clasp the hand of the young American amateur, and not infrequently slapping him on the back or hugging him in the most un-British manner. 'Bobby is the world's most lovable sportsman,' they said. 'This is the most popular golfing victory ever seen in Great Britain.'
"Bobby made the best speech of his career, which has contained rather more actions than words; he told them it was honour enough just to have his name on the old cup with all those great names. And the happiest part of the trip was the 50-mile ride through a soft English twilight from St Annes to Liverpool and home! 'Home with the Golden Fleece'."
And an entry ticket for two shillings and sixpence.
