Tom Peters’ Golf Tour: Digby Has Those Delectable World Famous Scallops & The Digby Pines Resort & Golf Course
By Tom Peters
DIGBY — Nova Scotia’s historic town of Digby is known for many things, but what stands out for me are those delectable, world-famous scallops and the Digby Pines Resort and its golf course.
Situated on the shores of the Annapolis Basin, which connects to the Bay of Fundy through the Digby Gut, Digby was settled in 1783 by United Empire Loyalists from New York and New England.
On my first visit to the resort and The Pines course, both of which were sold last year to Halifax businessmen Besim Halef and Glenn Squires and the nearby Bear River First Nation, I discovered a celebrity-based fan club had been established over the years, with members including George Herman “Babe” Ruth. The great ‘Bambino” was known for his raw power and his prowess to pepper outfield bleachers with baseballs served up by pitchers trying to strike out the New York Yankees’ home run king.
The ‘Sultan of Swat’ as he was also known, belted many long balls in his day not only with a baseball bat made out of ash but also with wooden golf clubs.
One of the Babe’s most memorable drives, a historic event at The Pines Golf Club, was a 320-yard bullet from the tee to the 11th green.
The actual date the Babe gripped it and ripped it isn’t exactly known but a reprint of an autographed scorecard and Babe’s photo in the club’s history book suggests it was the summer of ‘42.
This oil painting of golfers finishing their round on the 18th hole at Digby Pines Resort and Golf Course was done by Notebook copy editor John DeMings. If you want to buy it, send me an email: andrew@www.themacdonaldnotebook.ca. The painting is on canvas, 20″ by 30″.
“Local golfers have never forgotten that the Babe’s drive from #11 tee landed on the green,” says a note in the club’s history.
Stanley Thompson’s design for the Pines was also a hit with many other personalities who came to enjoy the pleasures of the resort and the challenging design laid out over approximately 130 acres on nearby Mount Pleasant.
Former head professional Bill Nickerson, who took over the head pro’s job from his father Charles in 1974, and whose son Scott is now head professional at The Pines, recalls as a caddie seeing American film star Cliff Robertson coming down the steps of the clubhouse and stopping to sign autographs.
Then there were other sports stars like Bill Eziniki, a former right-winger with the NHL’s Boston Bruins who came in the 1960s to play in the Maritime Open; former world heavyweight boxing champ Joe Louis, who vacationed at The Pines; and Canada’s own PGA star George Knudson, who loved to work the ball around Thompson’s design.
It was really the sweet-swinging Knudson who put a stamp of credibility on the 6,283-yard course that Thompson routed through woods and over rolling farmland. The par-71 layout plays to as short as 5,007 yards.
Stanley Thompson’s design for the Digby Pines was also a hit with many other personalities who came to enjoy the pleasures of the resort and the challenging design laid out over approximately 130 acres on nearby Mount Pleasant.
Scott Nickerson told me in a recent email that the course is enjoying a banner year even during the pandemic.
“I think people who know our course and Stanley Thompson courses enjoy ours with Stanley using what the land gave him to work with. If the ground was flat then the fairway is flat. If it had lots of little mounds then that’s the uneven fairway you get,” Scott says.
“You can play our course a number of days in a row and each time you think ‘These are not the same holes I played yesterday’. The wind always plays a factor in the score and if you happen to play on a day with no wind you would be surprised how differently some of the holes can play,” he adds.
Scott says the new owners are working with the golf operations team and a consultant to develop a rehabilitation plan for the course “which we hope to start implementing as soon as this Fall. One of the guiding principles of the plan is to preserve, and, in some cases, restore some of the elements that Stanley Thompson-designed courses are known for.”
The owners, he said, are also working with an interior designer to develop plans for a number of areas of the resort, including the clubhouse and 19th Hole restaurant.
Digby Pines’ Resort and Golf & Country Club. The Pines layout is a masterful piece of Thompson architecture. Golf course architect Geoffrey Cornish reportedly said: “Digby Pines has Stanley Thompson’s special brand of magic.”
The course opened in 1931. Thompson used horses and oxen to mold the landscape into a layout that has withstood the onslaught of the game’s technology.
“He didn’t change much. He worked with the natural contours and most of our mounds around the bunkers are piles of rocks stripped from the fairways. Rocks and stumps over-seeded with fescue,” course superintendent Bill LeBlanc once told me.
The second hole, a 177-yard par-3, definitely grabs your attention just into your game. From a very elevated tee, you see a long slender green guarded by a pond on the left and a steep bank on the right. The green slopes from the back right to the front left. A solid par-3 to get the juices flowing.
As you make your way around the course, you’ll notice the narrow fairways with lots of rolls and elevation changes. The greens are, for the most part, small by today’s standards, with many subtle breaks. This is very much a course that requires positional play at all times.
Digby Pines.
The 12th hole is considered the toughest on the course. The hole plays 418 yards from the back tees and requires a good drive down a narrow fairway which will leave you with a long second shot into a small, hidden green. Adding to the difficulty and length to the hole is the fact it plays mostly uphill.
The 14th hole is the first of two contrasting par-3s on the inward nine. It measures 207 yards from the very back tees but plays even longer since it is slightly uphill to the green. The green slopes from the back to the front and is trapped both left and right.
The par-3 16th is one of those short, fun holes. From a very elevated tee, it is only 116 yards over a pond to the centre of the putting surface. A nice high shot will stick like glue. If no one is behind you, hit three or four shots just for practice. It’s a hoot, pretty much like the whole course!
