1926
The Charter
Forty-one founders sign the book in the long room of the Marlowe farmhouse. Dues: one hundred dollars, payable — the minutes insist — “in coin or in kind.”
Private · Printed for members
Marlowe Hunt Club
Founded MCMXXVI · Marlowe, Virginia
The Centenary Volume · 1926 – 2026
Turn scroll, as one turns a page
The Founder’s Foreword
From the first minute-book, read aloud each April at the Opening of the Books
Gentlemen — and I address posterity as much as the present company — we did not gather to found an institution. We gathered because the country between the Marlowe woods and the river bend was too fine to leave unridden, and the evenings after shooting too good to spend apart.
If this Club endures, let it endure as it began: a fire kept lit, a table kept long, a course kept honest. Build nothing you cannot maintain. Admit no one you would not ride beside. And never — under any provocation — hurry.
The rest of it — the silver, the ceremony, the hundred years — will attend to itself.
Edmund T. Marlowe
Master of Foxhounds · 1926 – 1941
The
Grounds
Three hundred and forty acres between the oak allée and the river bend — kept, not manicured.
340
Acres
6,412
Yards
71
Par
91
Oaks in the Allée
The Course
Eighteen holes laid out by Harlan G. Wills in the winter of 1925–26, walked before they were drawn. Not one foot of it level; not one yard of it unfair.
The Kennels
Home to the Marlowe pack — twenty couple of English foxhounds whose bloodlines are recorded with rather more care than some members’ own.
The Oak Allée
Ninety-one white oaks planted the week the Club was chartered. The drive in takes one minute. Members are encouraged to make it last.
The River Bend
The Marlowe holds the eastern boundary and, by long tradition, every ball struck at the seventh with anything less than full conviction.
The
Century
1926 – 2026
Ten moments from one hundred years — chosen by the Archivist, disputed by everyone else.
1929
The Lean Table
The crash takes fortunes; it does not take the fire. The kitchen serves game from the grounds, the books balance by candlelight, and no member is asked to leave.
1937
The First Frost Cup
A wager between the Hollis brothers becomes the Club’s fiercest fixture: eighteen holes on New Year’s morning, whatever the sky sends.
1943
Fairways to Furrows
Fairways two through six go under the plough for victory acreage; sixty-two members serve overseas. Five names are read aloud each November at the Opening Meet.
1954
The Fire
An ember from the kitchen chimney, a north wind, and by morning the clubhouse is ash. The steward saves the doors and the minute-books. Rebuilding begins within the month.
1968
The Nursery Nine
Monday afternoons are surrendered to members’ children under Professional Tom Keel. The first class produces three club champions and one incurable slice.
1977
The Ladies’ Book
The Ladies of Marlowe — riders, shots, and golfers since the first season — take their long-overdue seats on the Board. The minutes note “a marked improvement in the quality of decisions.”
1989
The Restoration
Harlan Wills’s field drawings surface in a Richmond bank vault. Over two winters the course is returned to his hand — bunker by bunker, oath by oath.
2003
The Centennial Oaks
Ninety-one saplings — one for each oak of the allée — are planted along the river walk: a bequest to a century no founder would see.
2026
The Centenary
One hundred years of kept Saturdays. The volume you are turning is the record — and, for a fortunate few, the invitation.
The Traditions
Three fixtures by which the Club sets its clock — none of them optional in any way that matters.
The Opening Meet
First Saturday of November
Hounds at the allée gate at seven; stirrup cups at half past; the field away by eight. Attendance is not compulsory. Absence is noticed.
The Stag Dinner
The Winter Solstice
One table, sixty feet, no place cards; game from the grounds, claret from the cellar. Speeches are limited to the length of a struck match.
The Frost Cup
New Year’s Day, First Light
Eighteen holes in whatever the year begins with — frost, fog, or worse. The trophy is small. The bragging rights are not.
Correspondence
Membership at Marlowe is extended by invitation of the Board, upon the proposal of one member and the second of another. It has, however, been known for an invitation to follow a well-written card.
Received with thanks.
Your card is on the Secretary’s desk. Expect a reply within the fortnight — by hand, as is the custom.
End Papers
This centenary volume was set in Marcellus and Cormorant, and drawn — every crest, elevation, hound, and oak — in vector ink. No photograph appears in it. The Club has always preferred the drawn line: it flatters no one, and it lies less.
One hundred years of kept Saturdays.
Marlowe Hunt Club · Marlowe, Virginia
MCMXXVI — MMXXVI
Finis