George Grant: The Golf Tee

Up until 1898 golf balls were placed on a pile of sand. George Gram decided that this would never due, he then in 1898 created the golf tee. In 1991 the golf association finally recognized his contribution to the game. But, even in today's world blacks are considered to have no hand in creating or improving the game.

An early tee designer who gets a lot of attention today in websites and the popular press is Dr. George Grant, the first black graduate of Harvard's dental school. His version of the tee, patented in 1899, consisted of a vertical rubber tube attached at its base to a carrot-shaped piece of wood.