The Black Saturday bushfires of February 7, 2009 tore apart a number of country communities across the state of Victoria, the devastation greater than any other natural disaster in our history. As the tragic events unfolded, few in the beautiful rural hamlet of Marysville thought of golf, or what this carnage might mean to the town’s popular golf and bowling club.
On the morning of the fire the club ran its weekly Saturday comp, the winner a young teenage boy with a score of plus 5; an impressive score considering the windy conditions. Sadly it would be the young boys last round of golf, he passed in the fire along with other members of his family. Virtually all of the golf club’s members here lost homes, neighbours, friends or loved ones. This was a tragedy on an almost incomprehensible scale.
As was widely reported at the time, the town of Marysville was nearly wiped completely from the map on February 7, the dinky flat-roofed clubhouse at the Marysville Community Golf & Bowls Club one of just 14 structures to have somehow survived the firestorm. The clubhouse became a logistical hub for the recovery mission that followed the disaster, police and rescue workers set up their headquarters here while grieving residents made use of the building to hold meetings, memorials, funerals and the social gatherings necessary to help start the healing process.
While its clubhouse survived the fire, the Marysville golf course was less fortunate with greens, trees, irrigation systems, machinery sheds and machinery, chemicals, carts and bridges all badly damaged or destroyed. Like many clubs, this one had adequately insured its clubhouse but underestimated the damage a fire could do to the actual golf holes. In this case the bill toped $1million, yet incredibly the course has already reopened, thanks to the hard work of volunteers and the generous support of the wider golfing community. Along with grants and water concessions from government, the club received numerous donations from across the country and even overseas while greenkeepers from around Victoria donated their time and skills to relay all the greens. Aside from the blackened Eucalypts and a large loss of foliage through the back nine, the course at Marysville has returned to something like its pre-fire state.
Marysville’s loss has been so great, however, that to attempt to put the hurt and sorrow into words still seems disrespectful to those unable to tell their story. In terms of the golf club, there is short-term financial stability here now, but longer-term things still seem bleak as membership numbers have dropped due to relocation or worse, and green fee players are proving difficult to attract.
The other club affected by fire on Black Saturday was the Horsham Golf Club, one of the jewels of Victorian golf and ranked 71 in the nation on the 2008 Australian Golf Digest Top 100 list. While no lives were lost in the Horsham fires, the clubhouse and pro shop were destroyed, as was the club’s equipment shed, most of its machinery, $1 million in golf stock and around 15,000 trees. There was also damage to the irrigation system, yet a similar outpouring of support across the industry has helped Horsham bounce back and its cherished layout is now open for business again and frankly looking fantastic.
Golf clubs are often an integral part of the fabric of country life in Australia, and, if nothing else, Black Saturday has taught us the importance of community togetherness. Like the rest of the nation, golfers proved a generous and caring bunch after the fires and, for the sake of the rural game, we call on metropolitan readers to support country golf this month. Getting to Marysville or Horsham may not be possible, but playing just one rural round during February should provide both a stimulus to the golf club in question as well as a reminder to all players of just what our great game means to these smaller communities.
Darius Oliver, Architecture Editor Australian Golf Digest
