Please consider supporting our efforts.
| 
| Hits: 173
Sofia Golf Club, Bulgaria. (1921 -1944)
The Sofia Golf Club was founded in 1921.
The Sportsman, Friday 25 May 1923, carried the following report by Mr. A. H. Jackson, a veteran athlete, member of the Press Club, and enthusiastic golfer: “We have a Golf Club in Sofia which possesses a seven holes course at present hardly up to Walton Heath standards, par example. Not having a ground man, there is no fairway, but we have ‘local rules’ to deal with it, inasmuch as the player can pick up his ball and tee it up for the next shot. The ‘greens’ are not ‘greens’ being made of sand, and, as they are not rolled or set, the ball, when putted, does a kind of hornpipe dance, and, if lucky, reaches the hole, which, in the absence of proper iron pots, is lined with salmon tins. There is an art in putting on these ‘greens’ which would puzzle the best of the Press Club golf circle.”
By 1927, the club had developed a 9-hole course measuring 2,060 yards. Mr. José de Romero y Dusmet served as club president, with Miss Evelyn Mudford as secretary, and a Mr. Weleff employed as greenkeeper. The amateur course record stood at 73 for eighteen holes, while the professional record was sixty-seven. A restaurant operated at the clubhouse.
Information from the Plumon Guide 1927.
José de Romero y Dusmet was Minister Plenipotentiary of Spain in Sofia, Bulgaria, at the time the Sofia Golf Club was founded. He passed away in Sofia in May 1928.
The entrance fee was 1,000 leva for gentlemen and 700 leva for ladies, while the annual subscription amounted to 1,500 leva for gentlemen and 500 leva for ladies.
On Friday 8 June 1928, the Daily Express reported under the headline ‘Bulgar Golf Fever’: “From the turnip to the golf course is not a far cry, and Sofia is now in the throes of golf fever. The Golf Club de Sofia held its first tournament the other day. The members – many of whom are fashionable women – declare that Sofia must no longer lag behind the other capitals of Europe in the Royal and Ancient Game, and they are consequently organising putting competitions, driving competitions, and ‘expositions d’approche,’ to encourage the game.”
By 1931, the course had been extended to 2,180 metres (2,380 yards). Mrs. Poulieva had become president, and Mr. Ph. Catley of the Union Palace Hotel served as secretary. The club then counted twenty-five permanent members, and Boris Ynatchkoff was employed as greenkeeper.
Entry from the Golfer’s Handbook 1937 - 1939.
Unfortunately, the exact location of the golf course is not known. All that is certain is that it lay approximately two miles (3 km) from Sofia.
Christoph Meister
December 2025
If anyone can help with the location of the earlier golf course please get in touch via the “Contact Us” facility on the website homepage. Strangely the Google Map below pinpoints an area marked “Golf Course” but there is no evidence of a course.