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LI Sports: A Chronology

Bobby Jones, one of the greatest golfers in history, won the U.S. Open at Inwood Country Club in 1923. (United States Golf Association)

Compiled by Judy Weinberg

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1664: The first organized sport in America, horse racing, begins when the first English Governor of New York, Richard Nicolls, establishes the Newmarket Course at Hempstead Plains, close to the present site of Roosevelt Raceway. The purpose was to encourage the improvement of horse breeding. Five years later, the first sweepstakes race is held.
May, 1750: A horse race at Newmarket means heavy business to the Brooklyn ferry, which carries more than 1,000 horses in one day.
1802: Horse racing is outlawed in New York.
1803: A sketch shows a game of ten-pin bowling in play in Suffolk County.

1819: Horse racing meets again are held on Long Island. The law is amended to permit the training, pacing, trotting and running of horses upon regulated courses, and upon private property in Queens, but only in May and October.
May 27, 1823: Eclipse, the North's racing champion, wins the first major horse race in the United States, taking two of three heats over Sir Henry from Virginia, the fastest thoroughbred in the South. The race was held before 100,000 spectators on the mile-long oval at Union Course in Jamaica.
1835: Henry Stannard of Connecticut runs a 10-mile race in less than an hour (59:48) before 30,000 people at Union Course to win $1,000.
1838: Long Island's famous trotter, Lady Suffolk of Smithtown, runs a mile in three minutes against the bay gelding Sam Patch in Babylon.
1851: New York Yacht Club hires George Steers of Long Island to build a ship to enter England's Royal Regatta for the first time in history. Steers builds a 95-foot, two-masted schooner called America. The sails are designed by R.H. Wilson in his Port Jefferson loft.
Aug. 22, 1851: America finishes first, sailing the 53 miles around England's Isle of Wight miles ahead of 14 of Britain's fastest yachts. The silver trophy. which cost $500, has since become known as the America's Cup.
July 20, 1858: First admission charge to a baseball game, 50 cents, is paid by 1,500 fans to see N.Y. All-Stars beat Brooklyn, 22-18, at Fashion Race Course, now present-day Corona, Queens.
June 19, 1867: The first Belmont Stakes is won by Ruthless in 3:05 over 1 5/8 miles at Jerome Park in the Bronx.
1877: Meadow Brook Club is formed for hunting and other outdoor sports by a group of men who lease a farmhouse on Hempstead Plains.
1879: Polo is first played on Long Island by members of the Meadow Brook Club in a racetrack infield at Mineola Fair Grounds.
1885: The first black baseball team, the Cuban Giants, is formed by employees of the Argyle Hotel in Babylon to play semipro white teams.
Sept. 17-30, 1887: Captain Harry Coleman Haff of Islip skippers the iron-hulled sloop Volunteer in its successful defense of the America's Cup over the British challenger Thistle.
1891: Golf pro Willie Dunn constructs a 12-hole course at Shinnecock Hills in Southampton. It is America's first private golf club. The labor for the course is done by local Indians. A year later, the clubhouse designed by architect Stanford White opens.
1895: Harry Coleman of Islip, using the first all-American crew in an America's Cup race, skippers The Defender to victory over England's Valkyrie III.
Nov. 9, 1895: First U.S. women's amateur golf championship at the Meadow Brook Club in Westbury is won by Mrs. Charles B. Brown with an 18-hole total of 132 over 12 other participants.
July 18, 1896: James Foulis wins the second U.S. Open with a 36-hole score over 36 holes at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club.