The Early History of the Club
Lord Ailsa was the first President, a position he held until his death in 1938. Provost John Marshall of Maybole was the first Captain and the membership included a Marquess, a Lord, an Earl, a Rear Admiral, a Lord Provost of Glasgow and 9 clergymen. By 1906 there were 500 members, about one half from Maybole and Girvan, one quarter from Glasgow and one quarter from Ayr, Prestwick, Troon and the rest of Ayrshire but with a sprinkling of members from as far away as London, Belfast, Aberdeen, Blackheath, Antrim and even South Africa. Today the membership numbers around 388 (inclusive of 68 ladies) comprising a broad cross section of society predominantly from Ayrshire and Glasgow but also from as far afield as Edinburgh, England, America, Belgium, Hong Kong, New Zealand and Switzerland.
All the land at Turnberry belonged to the Kennedy family and Lord Ailsa had been having negotiations since 1900 or earlier, to make land there available to Glasgow and South Western Railway Company for their project to build a hotel, serviced by an extension of their existing railway line between Glasgow and Alloway (dubbed 'The Golfers' Line' because it served many golf courses on the Ayrshire coast including Gailes, Barrassie, Troon and Prestwick). The extension line was to run along the spectacular coastline from Alloway to Girvan, via the proposed new 100 room hotel to be built at Turnberry.