Video: A Visit To Old Tom's Shop

The Links Trust has reimagined the historic Old Tom Morris shop at St. Andrews with a new clothing line and many of the shop design features exposed after years of layer-upon-decorating layer.

The storefront today looks eerily close to what it looked like in his day:

The result is very special place to go for worshippers of Old Tom. Getting to walk on the original stone floors of his most prominent and final shop is an honor. But to see markings left over from the club making days is a bit like stumbling on an archaelogical site:

And it's irresistable to not at least touch the dinged up wood counter top where Old Tom and his artisans finished clubs over looking the 18th green that he created (a view that had long been mysteriously covered by recent shop lessees). The playground, workspace and house of worship for the first and most important Golf God. (Don't forget all of the storied visitors who walked those floors too, from Bobby Jones to A.W. Tillinghast to C.B. Macdonald, for starters).

For a Golf Channel segment this week, I was joined by Laurie Watson of the Links Trust and Roger McStravick, author of a beautiful new book on Old Tom Morris. We chatted about the significance of the shop as a place to remember the man who is more responsible for shaping the game than any single figure in our sport.