(Photograph by Sotheby's.)

Ellis has been a professional collector for three decades, and has learned the tricks of the trade along the way as owner of his eponymous golf memorabilia business in Seattle. But now he is preparing to let it all go. "It was so much fun finding this stuff and tracking it down and taking ownership. It’s sleuthing and being in the right place at the right time," he says.

Considered a guru of this avocation, Ellis wrote both the 190-page The Golf Club, published in 2003, and his pièce de résistance, The Clubmaker’s Art, a 576-page, two-volume history of the golf club first published in 1997; the expanded, 784-page second edition was released earlier this year. With the completion of the second edition, Ellis decided it was time to part with his collection. He still plans to buy and sell the occasional club through his business, but he wants to spend more time with his wife, four children and three grandchildren. Experts hail the 650-lot auction as the most extensive club collection ever offered, and believe it will draw new admirers to the field.

Historic golf clubs range in price from a couple of hundred dollars for plentiful hickory-shaft clubs made in the first half of the 20th century to more than $300,000 for the very oldest. But, despite the huge popularity of the sport of golf, the number of club collectors is rather minuscule, in part, Ellis explains, because of the dearth of clubs. "The golf club market has been a catch-22," he says. "It’s steady and stable, but it hasn’t grown much because there’s no supply. People don’t like to collect something that they can’t collect."

UNUSUAL CLUBS abound in the Jeff Ellis collection, including drivers with a screw to change loft, heads with holes for playing in puddles and clubs designed to be used left- or right-handed.

Kevin McGimpsey, Bonhams’ golf specialist in London, agrees. "There’s a small group of rare golf clubs, and most are in private collections. When they come on market, they command very high prices—$50,000 to $100,000—but those are exceptional," he says. "The majority of collectors buy clubs for $1,000, and maybe in 10 years they’ll get $1,200. It’s really a hobby, not a business for quick bucks and high-flying investments."

Collector Dick Estey’s assortment of golf memorabilia is so extensive that he bought a second condominium next to the one where he lives in Portland, Ore., and converted it into a 2,500-square-foot personal museum for his collection. The owner of an eponymous distribution company that, until a recent sale, was also the concessionaire for guest facilities at Crater Lake and Oregon Caves National Monument, Estey caddied for Sam Snead in 1946 and Henry Cotton, the captain of the British team, in the 1947 Ryder Cup. Between 1987 and 1997, he and his wife, Judy, crisscrossed the globe as he played national senior amateur tournaments, winning the Canadian championship once, the Mexican five times and finishing as British runner-up. In 1995, he met Ellis at Pebble Beach and, with his help, started amassing clubs. Estey’s collection also includes hundreds of other golfing items, including trophies, programs and art.

The True Sport of Kings
When it comes to clubs, as with other collectibles, sheer age contributes to the value. The first written reference to golf was in 1457, and the oldest clubs still in existence date back to the 1600s, when King James I, best known for the Bible translation, legalized the playing of golf on Sundays and appointed the first royal club maker.

Estey’s collection includes a 1700s Andrew Dickson long nose that he bought for about $380,000, as well as one of only three known play clubs made by craftsman Simon Cossar and his son, David, in the late 1700s or early 1800s; he obtained it for $300,000. Estey looks at those prices philosophically. "When it’s the one-and-only, the price will exceed the true value," he says.

The Ellis auction will include 10 clubs from the 1600s to the early 1800s. The oldest examples are a square toe light iron from the 1600s and a square toe heavy iron circa 1700. The light iron is estimated at $150,000 to $250,000, the heavy iron at $150,000 to $200,000. Among notable sales that Ellis cites in his books are a mid-1700s scraper for high grass that sold at auction in 2001 for $150,000; a heavy iron from the late 1600s that went for $250,000; and an iron putter from the early 1800s purchased by the Los Angeles Country Club for $175,000.

VALUE JUDGMENT Long before Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson, there was King James I, who legalized golf playing on Sundays and appointed the first royal club maker. But despite the sport’s long history and huge popularity, the number of golf club collectors remains considerably small. Many experts believe this situation is about to change, as an extensive 650-lot auction of historic golf clubs goes on the block at Sotheby’s this fall.

Clubs made between the mid-1800s and early 1900s are more plentiful, but the most coveted models still sell for five figures. The value of these clubs often lies in the name of the artisan who crafted it. "The job of professional golfer was making the clubs and balls as well as participating in tournaments," says Graham Budd, who headed Sotheby’s London sports memorabilia department for 25 years before becoming a consultant to the auction house. "Old Tom Morris, known as the father of golf, was the first true, great professional. Some collectors would be thrilled to own a club he played and made." Morris clubs, according to Ellis, go for up to $15,000. Clubs made by Hugh Philp, another 19th-century legend, sell for several thousand dollars.

The big draws for some collectors, Budd says, are the "weird and wacky inventions" of the late 1800s and early 1900s. Inventors patented a number of mechanical clubs: irons with levers or screws to change loft or with rakelike heads for playing in puddles; putters with rollers or triangular heads with sides for short putts, long putts and chip shots; and even a driver filled with tiny lead balls that would roll forward during the shot, theoretically making the golf shot more powerful.

Ellis found a circa 1880 WG Roy President water iron—so-named because a huge hole in the middle made it "clear-headed"—hanging on the wall of a building in Scotland. He offered $20,000 for it—probably far more than it was worth, he admits, but he wanted it because it was so unusual. The owner at first refused to sell it, but months later he finally agreed to take the offer. It is estimated that the club will go for $15,000 to $25,000 at the auction.

THE ASSEMBLAGE is expected to bring in more than $4 million at auction this September.

Ellis doesn’t say which of his clubs are his favorites, and he doesn’t give estimates on what they might be worth. "These are darn near like kids to me," he says. "I can’t say, ‘I like this child better than that child.’ Each one has a special story. I don’t say what clubs are worth in my books, because I don’t want people to look at a club and say this one is only $300 so it can’t be as good as this one for $8,000. That’s not true. Some are more easily replaced, and some are more meaningful in how I got the club. It’s my golf club family."

Collector’s Handicap
As with all collectibles, buyers do risk forgeries. In some instances, clubs are "antiqued"—a name like MacGregor is sanded off and a celebrity name like Ty Cobb or W.C. Fields is added to boost the price of a $50 club to $5,000 or more, Ellis warns. He also cautions that some antiques are actually replicas of even older clubs. "Morris" clubs, for instance, were being made long after his death.

Ellis admits that, early in his collecting, he did buy an altered club. It was indeed old, but it had three modifications that seemed minor. Later, he realized they weren’t so innocent. In general, the few who create bogus antique clubs do not possess the critical understanding of antique clubmakers, Ellis says, which means a trained eye can spot alterations, along with differences in materials and patina. He adds that clubs in poor condition, even those associated with an important name, may be worth far less than their more pristine counterparts.

Jim Leaptrott, a Portland, Ore., collector who was in the telecommunications business and is now director of sales at a country club, will be among the bidders at the Ellis sale. Leaptrott’s father attended the first Masters Tournament in 1934 and golf clubs were always around his house growing up. "I met Jeff Ellis, and the monster has grown," he says. He owns about a dozen clubs, ranging in value from $200 to $20,000, including a rut iron designed to hit balls that landed in gouges caused by wagon wheels. Leaptrott, whose clubs have been on display at the British Columbia Golf House, looks forward to the Ellis auction. "It’s going to be an opportunity for people to be exposed," he says. "A lot of this stuff is almost folk art, and you apply folk art style to the game of golf, and you have something very pleasing. You get us going, and there’s fire in the belly."

However, Leaptrott cautions that a person buying only for investment purposes may be disappointed. "If you buy any type of collectible with strict investment in mind, it loses its allure," he says. "With odd collections, like golf clubs, there’s not a broad-based market. It’s not like coins or stamps where you have guides that list types and prices. About the only points of reference are dealer price lists and auction catalogs."

Ellis tried to find a buyer interested in his entire collection, and approached Estey about obtaining it outright, but his friend declined. "What’s fun is collecting," Estey explains. "If you buy a collection, you have it, but then you’re not collecting anymore."

As for Ellis, the sale marks a turning point in his life. The collecting that started as a teenager became a passion that he turned into his life’s work. "It’s been a journey that has taken 30 years," he says. "I started with nothing and built a collection. Now the books are done—at 15 pounds, there’s not a lot that’s missing."

Additional Information
 Well-Rounded Collections

Debra Ryono is associate managing editor for Worth.