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TIME: Almanac 1990
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1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
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091189
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09118900.005
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1990-09-17
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LIVING, Page 73Welcome to Putter's ParadiseMiniature golf, a '20s fad, comes back in style
On Manhattan's West 21st Street, wooden bananas whirl over a
patch of fake turf, while strutting pink flamingos pick at another
patch. A wide-mouthed, 12-ft.-long Fiberglas alligator waits to
swallow a fluorescent golf ball. No, it's not a discarded backdrop
from Miami Vice. The gator's peristaltic mechanism is just about
the toughest hole at Putter's Paradise, a miniature-golf course in
New York City's Chelsea district. "If you hit the ball too hard,
it just bounces right back out of the mouth," explains
co-proprietor Jeanne Horning. "If you hit it too soft, it just
rolls around in there and doesn't go through."
Miniature golf, a craze of the late '20s, is staging a
comeback. In 1930 more than 25,000 courses dotted the American
landscape from Lookout Mountain in Tennessee to Los Angeles, with
several of the most popular atop New York City skyscrapers. As many
as 4 million Americans putted every day, and a popular song bore
the title I've Gone Goofy over Miniature Golf. By the early '30s,
the game's appeal withered as quickly as it had risen, though
mini-courses remained a staple of beach resorts.
The boomlet can be credited to the upsurge in nostalgia for the
pop culture of recent periods and the growing popularity of
full-scale links. There are an estimated 1,800 courses in the U.S.,
54% of them built since 1981, according to one survey. Upwards of
50 million Americans played the tiny greens last year. Some argue
that the resurgence is the result of fancy new courses. Once played
on flat bits of artificial turf with hollow logs and windmills as
props, the modern versions are built around themes of jungle
adventures, pirate ships and treasure hunts, with waterfalls,
mountains and boat rides. "It's not that people are suddenly saying
`Let's go play miniature golf,'" notes Tim Troy, part owner of Lost
Mountain Adventure Golf, a new course outside Chicago. "It's that
they didn't have anyplace to play."
One of the latest links is Donald Trump's Gotham Golf, a
nine-hole, 10,000-sq.-ft. course in Central Park. Opened last
month, it features, among replica landmarks like the Statue of
Liberty, two of Trump's prized possessions, Trump Tower and the
Plaza Hotel.
But not everyone is convinced that the mini-boom will last.
Don Clayton, chairman of Putt-Putt Golf Courses of America, which
has 325 U.S. franchises, says gross revenues from the links have
quadrupled over the past ten years, but a glut of new courses could
lead to a collapse. Still, a game that costs as little as $1.50 to
play (or around $7 at the adventure setups) has a certain built-in
demographic appeal. Says Gary Knight of Lomma Enterprises, a
Scranton, Pa., company that builds miniature courses: "Baby boomers
have children now and want something to do with their family.
Miniature golf fits the bill, and it's cheaper than going to the
movies." That doesn't sound very goofy at all.