Ex-Gers chief hands over 30,000 golf books as gift

LEGACY: US-based enthusiast to create Old Course library

Former Rangers chairman Alastair Johnston is to donate the world’s largest collection of golf books to help create a new library in St Andrews.

The US-based businessman has amassed almost 30,000 books on the sport after he began collecting them more than 50 years ago.

He has now announced plans to gift them to the game’s ruling body the R&A to help establish the world’s largest, most comprehensive collection of golf books.

It will be named the Alastair J Johnston Library and will be sited next to the Old Course in the Fife town, known as the Home of Golf.

Glasgow-born Mr Johnston, who is still a director on the Ibrox board, started collecting golf books in 1969 during an internship at sports management firm IMG, where he is now vice-chairman.

His books date as far back as 1566 and feature works by many of golf’s most prominent writers, players, historians, architects and biographers.

The collection is currently kept in a library at his home in Cleveland, Ohio.

Mr Johnston, 71, said: “I am honoured that the R&A has accepted so gracefully the donation of my golf library.

“The commitment it is making to locate it in St Andrews, in the epicentre of the historical roots of the game of golf and provide future guardianship of so much that has been printed about it over the last 400 years or so, is very much appreciated.

“As a native Scot, I am thrilled that many unique publications will be returning to their rightful location in my homeland, which comports with the aspiration I made to assemble as complete a collection as possible with contributions from friends and generous strangers.

Mr Johnston currently adds up to 800 new items to the collection each year and the latest edition of the bibliography, which he publishes annually, contains two volumes and amounts to more than 900 pages.

Titles include The Goff, An HeroiComical Poem In Three Cantos”, which was the first book devoted purely to golf and written by Thomas Mathison in 1743; and Chronicles Of Golf: 14571857 which Mr Johnston wrote with his father James F Johnston and is widely recognised as the seminal early history of the sport.

The library will remain at Mr Johnston’s home in Cleveland while plans are made for its relocation to St Andrews, where it will be managed by the Museum and Heritage department of the R&A.

It is hoped the library will be in place ahead of the 150th Open Championship at St Andrews in 2021.

R&A chief executive Martin Slumbers said: “We are very grateful to Alastair for this generous gift.

“We are excited to continue his vision and support his desire to display this collection in its entirety in Scotland.”

Alastair Johnston with the archive of golf books.