From the Archives: Are left-handed golfers rare? Not in this district in Scotland

This past Tuesday was International Left-Handers Day, a celebration of southpaws that, if we’re being honest, we didn’t know existed. As it turns out, this was the 32nd observance, according to the group Anything Left-Handed LTD (which we also didn’t know existed). No matter its import or authenticity, ILHD allowed us to have a little fun pondering what it would be like if some of the game’s all-time great right-handed golfers played as lefties.

There are, of course, plenty of high-caliber golfers who are left-handers, including major champions Bob Charles, Bubba Watson, Mike Weir, Brian Harman and arguably the most famous of all, Phil Mickelson. That said, while 10-12 percent of the worldwide population is believed to be left-handed, various reports say only around 6 percent of golfers play left-handed. The discrepancy has long been believed to be a function of fewer lefty junior golf clubs available when kids first get interested in the game, causing them to break into the sport as righties. This is something that golf club manufacturers are remedying but also still a factor for why lefty golfers are far less common than righties.

There is one place in the world, though, where left-handed golfers are closer to the rule than the exception. Back in October 1985, Golf Digest ran a story entitled “The Left-Handers’ Brigadoon.” Dudley Doust, then the chief sports feature writer for The Sunday Times of London—and himself a lefty—wrote about the district of Badenoch, hidden along a mountain valley in the Scottish highlands, in which it was estimated that 40 percent of the golfers were left-handed.

You can read the full story here in the Golf Digest Archive of every issues dating back to the magazine’s founding in 1950—which Golf Digest+ members have full access to.

Doust first traveled to the area in 1975, visiting a course called Kingussie. On the wall in the clubhouse was a small photograph circa 1913 that showed three members posing behind the 18th green. And in it all three men were holding left-handed clubs.

In the story, Doust interviewed regulars at this course and other golfers to fact-check the numbers first provided by Peter Stuart of the Left Handed Golfers’ Society of Great Britain. Granted, the overall population of the area was little more than 2,100, and not all played golf. But still, as Doust visited the area, here’s what he found:

The statistics had more than supported veterinarian Stuart's figures. Of the 40 valley-born members at Kingussie, 23 (or 57.5 percent) had played the Royal and Ancient game from the port side. "That doesn't count the three other members we will have to put in the 'don't know' category," Menzies had added. "They play cack-handed, that is to say, they hold the club with the left hand down the shaft and swing it right."

I had taken a similar survey a few miles down the valley at the Newtonmore club, which, as though sharing a feeling of embattlement, has reciprocal membership with Kingussie. The figures there had been nearly as startling: Of the 38 valley-born members, 18 (or 47.4 percent) were lefties. "And I'm not counting myself," said the Newtonmore secretary, Sandy Russell, himself a switch-hitter who once held a right-handed handicap of 5 and a lefty of 7.”

(Golf Digest+ members get access to the complete Golf Digest archive dating back to 1950. Sign up here.)

In writing this story, Doust returned nine years later to find that the numbers from these courses continued to hold up. “Of the 31 valley-born members at Kingussie, 11 (or 35.5 percent) were lefthanded. At Newtonmore, I learned that 17 (or 41.5 percent) of the 41 members were lefty, ignoring an influx of four cack-handers.”

Doust’s story is a fun narrative of his time in the region and his attempt to solve the mystery of Badenoch’s left-handedness. We won’t spoil the ending, leaving you to read the story yourselves to learn the reason as well as discover some fun facts. Like for instance, the Quaich Bowl is the name of the oldest golf trophy in the world for left-handers. Yep, once again we didn’t know it existed … until now.