Golf was the most popular stick and ball game throughout the 1800s in the UK, but it wasn't the golf played in Scotland. It was 'poor man's golf' as played throughout all the former Danelaw area of England and more properly called knur and spell.

This game was played by thousands of players, in hundreds or even thousands of locations, across a very wide area. It was played for centuries in all the northern counties of England including the ones which border on Scotland. It was even played it Scotland itself and was also played in Australia.

Strangely enough, the Scots rarely give this game a mention when they talk about the origins of golf. How does that work?

Blacksmith's son, David Lunt, was born in Colne, Lancashire (UK). This was one of the last places in the world where "Poor Man's Golf" (knurr and spell) was played. Having earlier written a biography about Australian professional golfer, Jack Harris, and having struggled to play the game of golf himself for over sixty years, Lunt decided that it was now time to understand how and where this obsession, which is shared by millions of nutters all around the world, had its genesis. His findings were very surprising. Equally surprising was the fact that knurr and spell had also been played in Philadelphia, USA in the early 1860s prior to the rapid growth in the game of baseball. But that may be a story for the future!