WAY THEY WERE IN N-E ALLIANCE OF YESTERYEAR

A North-east Alliance championship (?) presentation from yesteryear with Chapper Thomson (Muriel's father), then the secretary, presenting the trophy to Harry Bannerman. Jock Lawson is to the immediate right of Harry. A young-looking Ronnie McDonald, now Kemnay club pro, is on the extreme right. You can enlarge the image by clicking on it.

JOCK LAWSON: Murcar professional who
made Muriel Thomson a star

By COLIN FARQUHARSON

Jock Lawson, who died a few weeks ago at Tain, was part-and-parcel of the North-east golf season for 13 years as professional at Murcar Golf Club so it is only right that Scottishgolfview.com traces his life story.
Muriel Thomson was a Murcar member and a successful amateur golfer before she became a successful tournament professional and then settled down as professional at Portlethen Golf Club.
Muriel says that Jock played a key role in her development as a golfer.
CHANGED HER GRIP
“I was at Jock’s funeral in Tain and was honoured to be asked by his family to speak at the service and pay tribute to him. I had always kept in touch with him and had visited him at Tain,” said Muriel.
“It was Jock who gave me my first golf lesson when I was a girl. I had joined Murcar as a cack-handed golfer. He was the one who changed my grip for me (round about the age of 15) and he was completely dedicated to seeing me improve.
“Jock Lawson was really the only golfing mentor I had. He taught me right through into my pro career when I visited him at Thorpeness. Yes, Jock played a very important part in my golfing career.
UNDER JOCK'S WING
“Who knows what path I might have gone down had Jock not been there at Murcar and taken me under his wing as a junior.”
Jock Lawson was born in Fife – either in 1920 or 1923, some doubt about which year – but brought up in Callander.
He got his toe on the ladder of PGA golf when he became an assistant at Windyhill Golf Club in 1938.
World War II came along in September 1939 and Jock served in the RAF.
On his demob, he picked up his golf career again as an assistant pro at Minchinhampton Golf Club, Gloucester in 1946. The following year he gained his first full club pro appointment at Barford Golf Club, near Oxford.
In 1953 he moved to Thornaby on Tees Golf Club, Yorkshire.
MOVE TO MURCAR IN 1959
In February 1959, he succeeded Bill McHardy as professional at Murcar Golf Club. The Press and Journal report of the time said that Jock was 36 at that time.
Jock soon built up a reputation as a golf teacher but he could also play the game and was a regular and sometimes successful competitor on the North-east Alliance circuit.
A contemporary of Alliance stalwarts such as Joe Little, Innes Wright, John Grant, Ian Phillips, Harry Bannerman, Graham Everett and Ian Smith, Jock was beaten four or five times in the final – with different partners – in the North-east Alliance pro-am foursomes.
He did win the NE Alliance mixed foursomes – whatever happened to that event? – for the George Duncan Trophy with Murcar’s Mrs Balfour at Banchory in April 1960. They headed a field of more than 50 couples with a gross 76, winning from Jimmy Nicol and Miss Margaret Brown (Peterhead) and Finlay Morrison and Mrs Kennaway (Deeside).
OFFER HE COULD NOT REFUSE
In early 1972, Jock Lawson received what he described as an offer he could not refuse from Tenby Golf Club, Pembrokeshire and he left to take up the South Wales post in 1972. His successor at Murcar was John Nicol.
“I had been very, very happy indeed at Murcar and they were very good to me but I just couldn’t turn down the offer from Tenby,” said Jock
After a few years at Tenby, Jock Lawson was tempted to move again and he did – to Shawhill Hotel golf courses at Chorley in Lancashire.
Later he moved to another hotel golf course set-up at Thorpeness in Surrey.
In the early 1980s, Jock returned to Scotland, as he had always wanted to, and spent a happy few years as Tain Golf Club professional. He retired in 1987 and was made an honorary member of the Professional Golfers Association.
He was in his 80s when he died in November 2006.
IF YOU HAVE ANY MEMORIES OF JOCK LAWSON, YOU CAN E-MAIL THEM TO colin@scottishgolfview.com