Modern History I start my story from where Bman ends his. When I returned to Oakland, I was excited to begin playing Urban Golf. I have always loved playing in the streets since I was a kid. And since my aging bones and body couldn't take too much more thrashing around on inline skates, Urban Golf seemed like a great low-impact street sport. Within the next few months, I had talked up Urban Golf to my crew, bought a bunch of tennis balls and beat up clubs from Goodwill, and moved into a warehouse in neighboring Emeryville. Emeryville, at the time, was a very quiet industrial area at night. It was desolate and a lot safer than West Oakland, where I had been previously. Unfortunately, in the last five years, Emeryville has become infested with Ikea shoppers, artists' warehouses converted to "modern lofts", and just general traffic and congestion. We took to the streets with our hooptie clubs and tennis balls. I can't honestly remember the very first game we played. I do remember the early games being a little chaotic and unfocused as we wandering around town trying to figure out how to create, let alone play, Urban Golf. Our biggest challenge was to learn how to use golf clubs, since most of us never played golf before. Then we had to figure out the groundwork for the game. Bman's game was one really long hole. We decided to try to model ours on a real golf game, with multiple holes. At first we were going to try to play an 18 hole course. After 6 hours of golfing, at 2 am, we decided to call it quits. We were starting to get cold and a little tired, and that was after only 14 holes. Over the next few months we kept playing games of various lengths, until we finally decided 9 was a good number. We had crews of many differents sizes, some up to 15 people which was just way too big. Too many stops to find lost balls, small groups breaking off into conversations and not paying attention to the game, and a large club-carrying mob that frightened neighbors were among the problems of golfing with a large group. After many games, we've found that 6-10 people make the best outings. Over the years, we golfed around neighborhoods targeting dumpsters, trucks, walls, streetlights, etc. Eventually, we began to create a course, instead of wandering aimlessly. We had to constantly readjust the course to keep the loft-living yuppies from yelling at us for bouncing balls off their SUVs, or the security guards demanding we get off company property. Surprisingly, the Emeryville Police were as cool as the other side of the pillow. The only times they asked us to move was when they received a direct complaint. They eventually began to recognize us and often waved when they passed by. One time, one of the cops actually got out of his car to take a swing. Sometimes we adjusted the course just because the area we were playing was disgusting. For a while, we played into West Oakland, where we were downwind of the sewage treatment plant, searching for our balls out in piles of roadside garbage, and even disturbing small encampments of homeless people. During our West Oakland stint, we rescued a neglected guard dog who has been with me ever since. We named him Jack because we dog-jacked him. That's a story for another time. After at least 100 games, we finally created a course that didn't piss anybody off and was really fun to play, and we've played that one continuously for at least 2 years. We've also incorporated a golf bag that has wheels, which makes carrying all our gear a lot easier. It's also turned into a bit of a trophy because the winner of each game gets to sign the bag. Many players have come and gone over the years, some just for a game or two, others have stuck around to become the hardcore group of Urban Golfers always ready for a game. Just recently my girl and I moved to Berkeley. We'll still go back to Emeryville to play occasionally, but now we're going to begin developing the West Berkeley course. Even though having a set Urban Golf course is great, I miss the exploration and collaboration of creating a new course. We've had so much fun over so many games, I can't begin to tell all the stories here. But check the BLOG section for updates and anecdotes by members of our Urban Golf crew. Have fun playing, be safe, and follow the Golden Rules. Matt Spiro "Spatman" June 13, 2003