It’s A Mediocre Snack Bar
My name is Anthony Stipa. I like golf. That’s why the following space will be dedicated to the sport. How exactly that’s defined is yet to be determined. Either way, I thought I’d debut the site during Britsh Open Week 2011. Lucky you.
I’ll be voicing my opinions on the PGA Tour, other professional circuits and local (Philadelphia, Pa.) topics.
Growing up, my hometown has been abandoned by Tim Finchem, a corporate sponsor and a lot of other people in the industry. The country’s fifth (slowly slinking into sixth) most populous city, can’t nail down a regular PGA Tour stop. A city with a breadth of golf tradition and knowledge is missing a flagship event. It’s been well documented.
The city hosted the IVB-Philadelphia Golf Classic from 1963-80 and the SEI Pennsylvania Classic from 2000-02. Sprinkle in a handful of major championships (the last being the U.S. Open at Merion Golf Club in 1981) and AT&T’s recent two-year tenure in Newtown Square.
The AT&T National has revived hopes for a return to Philadelphia. Players and sponsors are slowly sinking their teeth into the region. I’ll remain skeptical. This makes me happy.
Anyway, I hope you sink your teeth into this blog. And, oh yea, the meaning of this blog? It’s just a mediocre snack bar that used to exist at a driving range in East Norriton, Pa. You can debate whether the sign was meant to read “Golfer Eats” or “Go Fer Eats”, but I’ll still take the latter.Wood’s (Woody’s) Driving Range was home to a lot of first swings including, probably, mine.
In early 2010, they officially tore down the joint. An 18-hole executive course, 9-hole chip-and-putt, 36-hole miniature golf course, driving range, an aforementioned snack bar (horrible water ice), about a half dozen arcade games and that’s about it. In fairness, it was torn down to build a hospital. Hard to argue against it.
Still, Wood’s was a place for golfers of any handicap. You could buy $5 clubs that were aged to perfection. The mats were faded, torn, crowned and hard as diamonds. Regardless, you could always get a good practice session in. The chip-and-putt played host to a million pint-sized Masters Tournaments. The greens were so undulated and slippery that it FELT like Augusta National. It was only fitting that along the roadside 3rd hole, cars filled with pubescent boys (and sometimes grown men) would scream obscenities looking for a shank or show of emotion.
There are plenty of good stories from that little cut of land, but I’ll save them for another time. RIP Wood’s, but hello blogosphere.
GoFer Eats 