The Waikouaiti Golf Club started as a "gentlemen's" club in 1935, when several Dunedin people who had holiday homes in Waikouaiti decided to form a golf club.
The first course was on the property of mayor Andrew Fellow, who had land on the south side of the town. The local people were allowed to play but it was primarily the old boys' course and was often reserved.
The club will hold its 75th-jubilee celebrations this weekend, with 100 past and present members attending. The guest speaker at the dinner on Saturday evening is Otago secondary school sports director Des Smith.
It was originally a typical country course, with sheep grazing the fairways and the 19th hole a table and a thermos flask in the corner of a paddock.
The club has been shifted several times to venues on Stewart's farm, where the 19th was a small hut, and then to Townsend's farm, where the 19th consisted of bales of wool and canvas.
In 1963, the club shifted to its present site near the beach, an area of treeless sand dunes, populated by rabbits.
One of the older former members coming south is Reg Grant, of Wellington. All five life members will be attending: Jim Hagan, Don McCrea, Jim Preston, Roly Young and Edna Hocking.
Members of the 170-strong club can play the nine-hole course every day of the year.
"This is because of our microclimate," club secretary-treasurer Karen Kelly said.
"We miss a lot of the bad weather. The sand-based surface gives us an all-weather course."
