Stuff You Should Know - Selects: How Miniature Golf Works

Episode Date: December 27, 2025

Playing miniature golf is a very fun thing to do and, you’re about to find, learning about its origin and history is very fun as well. Join Josh and Chuck in this classic episode as they tee off on the mini golf story!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an I-Heart podcast. Guaranteed Human. Hey, Harry Potter fans. Huge news. Harry Potter, the full cast audio editions, are all being released on Audible, on a monthly basis, and Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

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every month until all seven are out. Go to audible.ca slash HP1 and start listening now. Hi, Kyle. Could you draw up a quick document with the basic business plan? Just one page as a Google Doc and send me the link. Thanks. Hey, just finished drawing up that quick one-page business plan for you. Here's the link.

But there was no link. There was no business plan. I hadn't programmed Kyle to be able to do that yet. I'm Evan Ratliff here with a story of entrepreneurship in the AI age. Listen as I attempt to build a real startup run by fake people. Check out the second season of my podcast, Shell Game, on the IHeart Radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Whether it is getting swatted or just hateful messages online, there is a lot of harm and even just reading the comments. That's cybersecurity expert Camille Stewart Gloucester on the Therapy for Black Girls podcast.

Every season is a chance to grow. And the Therapy for Black Girls podcast is here to walk with you. I'm Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, and each week we dive into real conversations that help you. move with more clarity and confidence. This episode, we're breaking down what really happens to your information online and how to protect yourself with intention. Listen to therapy for black girls on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Hey, everyone. I thought it would be nice to ring in the new year with an easy select filled with Chuck and me reminiscing about our childhood memories of put-pud and slush puppies. So for this week's select, I give you our August

2020 episode, A Miniature Golf. And I want to take a moment to wish my dear wife, Yumi, a happy birthday. So happy birthday, Yumi, and to you, dear listeners, happy New Year. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of IHeart Radio. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Chuck Brian over there, And there's Jerry there, figuring all the new contrivances of modern life. Yeah, I mean, we should tell people what's going on, I think. It's interesting, right? No.

Well, I'm going to tell them. Fine. So Jerry has figured out now how to operate the studio Macintosh recording system and not be in the office. It's pretty great. It's COVID-Rific, actually. And so she was just up on our side. Skype on video, and she's still there, but when she switched it to mute, it went

to that distressing picture. Do you see that thing? No, I just see J.R. Like the letter J and the letter R. Oh, see. Oh, there she is. She's back. Okay. When she turned it off, though, I get a photograph of Jerry that looks like she's

like sick in bed or something. It's weird. This is a, well, that's just Jerry's look. Maybe so. I don't know. That's a diet of nothing but me so for 15. 20 years we'll do for you. The weirdest thing is this is as close as we've come to normal in four months. I know.

Not only is it like normal, it's almost like a throwback. Remember when we had the studio where we would look out the window when she was there? Yeah. Yeah, that was great. It's kind of like this again. She was a window creeper. Yep. Professionally and in her personal life, too.

That's right. So this is stuff you should know, everybody. I don't know if I said it. There are probably a few people who are confused and aren't anymore. but we haven't gotten started yet so prepare to be confused again when we explain something in particular Chuck

miniature golf I gotta ask are you a fan this made me want to play again like I grew up playing put putt sure and have very fond memories of all the different colored golf balls you know like the water trap

that was really just a stagnant little puddle of concrete you know but Puppet was wonderful and great, and there were arcades and birthday parties there that featured heavily with G.I. Joe action figures and stuff like that, the good kind, the three and three-quarter-inch ones. And, yeah, I am a fan, if not just nostalgically, in general, yes. And which style, and as a listener will see soon, there are a couple of different things, but did you grow up playing just sort of the bare-bones put-putt or the more miniature

golf, clown's mouth, windmill, volcano. Well, Chuck, if you ask me if I had a rich childhood, I will always tell you, yes, sir, yes, I did. And the reason why is because I grew up having put-put close by in Toledo, and we played that a lot. And then when my family would vacation in the summers on Catawba Island on Lake Erie, and this was like pre-cleaned up Lake Erie, there was a like a rundown little, like, mini golf with like clowns mouths and windmills and all that stuff right by the place where we used to stay like walking distance and so we'd play there a lot too so i had the best of both worlds a really great just top-notch childhood so i grew up playing put put puttut at stone mountain park which we went to a lot uh because it was near our church and the youth group would go and do put-putt nights and stuff so that was a lot of fun uh and i was sort of partial to those that were like Like, you know, the real put-putt where it requires a little bit of skill. But I am also a sucker for the Beachtown, Volcano, waterfall, go-kart, bumper boat, arcade scene.

Yep. Don't forget, laser tag. I never really did laser tag. I think that came around a little after I was, you know, in my prime union. for this kind of thing. Gotcha. Yeah, it wasn't, same here. But I was looking up now, they have a laser tag at Putt putt places.

But I still love those go-carts, man. When we go to Isle of Palms last year, I found a place nearby. And it's like, we got to go. And everyone was kind of like, oh, I don't know. And the kids are sort of like, yeah, I guess I'll do it.

And I was like, guys, we got to go. Right. Like, what is wrong with all of you? Who are you vacationing with Chuck? Oh, man, it was so much fun. Is there a carbon monoxide leak at the house you rent? No, those go-carts. I could do that all day long.

Yeah, for sure. And, of course, I got the guy, you know, the teenager, squeaky voice teenager, and I said, hey, man, which one, which is the fast one? And he was like, number eight. Really? Oh, yeah, and sure enough, it was really fast. You just ran circles around everybody? I did, such that I even laid off on the gas a little bit just to catch up and let people, you know, act like they did outrace me.

What a sportsman. Oh, my goodness. Well, we'll talk about go-carts one day more in-depth, but today we're just going to focus on the miniature golf, okay? Yeah, this is a pretty interesting history, I think. Yeah, I had no idea how far back it went until we started researching this. And actually, it goes all the way back to the 19th century,

and this is one of those rare things that's been around a while, but you can actually pinpoint, like, the first one. And the first miniature golf course in the world, as far as anybody knows, is at St. Andrews. It's the ladies' putting club of St. Andrews, and it was built in 1867 strictly for the women members of the ladies' putting club. Yeah, there's a couple of things that play here, actually really just one thing, which is not letting women do things. Yeah.

Because there was a decree, basically, that women shall not take the club back past their shoulder. The 11th Commandment. Yeah, like a real golf swing, in other words, was, I guess, improper. for a lady to do the victorian era was just so stupid when it came to social constraints i'm trying to figure out why does that i don't know did itriarchy i would guess well i just wonder why a full golf swing would it make their their dress rate rise a little above the ankle or like i just wonder why i think also women were expected to not overexert themselves physically especially in public too so You could kind of construe that as over-exertion.

Well, and then there's this, which is from an 1890 book by Scottish Baron Lord Wellwood, talking about women and when they should golf and when they shouldn't golf. I was going to do a Scottish accent, but I'm just not feeling it. If they choose to play at times when male golfers are feeding or resting, no one can object, but at other times, must we say it, they are in the way. It was kind of snarky to add even the must we say it. Like, do I even need to write this next sentence? It's so just drippingly obvious.

But the upshot of this is that's why they created the ladies' putting club is just to sort of get rid of them. Yeah, to get them out of the way of the men. But the joke was on the men because this putting green, this first miniature golf course in the world, is still around and it's still considered one of the finest. It's actually a nickname the Himalayas because it has all these kind of mountains and hills and hillocks all built into it. And they really kind of stand out from what I understand against like the Scottish seascape. And it's a really revered miniature golf course, but it is exactly what it sounds like. It is a golf course in miniature.

Like just like you take a classic golf course of the variety that was born in Scotland and you just kind of hit it with a shrink ray. and then you have a genuine bona fide miniature golf course. And that's how the whole thing started out. Yeah, I mean, it's what we would call like a par three today, right? Kind of. It seems like par three courses are a little different. So this is like, yes, I think it does require more than just a putter. Right.

And a par three would require more than a putter. But there seems to be a few different other kinds of golf courses, aside from the miniature golf course, there's the par three, the pitch and put and executive courses all kind of qualify technically as miniature golf courses in different ways. Yeah, the executive course,

they got the name because evidently an executive could go play a quick round during lunch. A lot of part three is. You might have like one par five and a couple of par fours. Is that right? On a par three? On an executive course.

Oh, okay. Yeah, that's what, that's, really the only thing from what I can tell that differentiates it from a par three course yeah it's it's it's a golf course it's just shorter and therefore doesn't take as long yeah and it's not like the hole is smaller and the ball is smaller and the clubs are smaller like just just get out of your fantasy land there instead it's just the the distance from the tee to the hole is shorter there's fewer bends and and stuff like that so the actual experience takes less time and less energy and you can just kind of fit it in in a shorter amount of time.

And I think that's the popularity of those things generally. Although pitch and putt courses I also saw, they usually consist of a wedge and iron and a putter or what you need to play on those. And they're all about the focus on the short game. And as a result, men and women, just average men and women who play golf, can kind of compete pretty evenly

because it's all about the short game. It's all about finesse rather than just sheer power of driving as far as you can on like a traditional golf course. Yeah, I mean, I love golf. I just don't play anymore. Like, I grew up playing golf and was not good, but I wasn't terrible for as much as I played. And I still like it. I just don't, you know, have the time or the inclination anymore.

But I like the big boy courses with the big par fives, but I also love a fun little par three. Like Florida has a lot of these beautiful par threes, including some you can play at night that are all lit up. And that's always a lot of fun, too. Yeah, I tried to get acquainted with golf as a youngster. My family had, weirdly enough, because this is not like my family at all, had a membership at Heather Downs Country Club in Toledo.

Oh, well. Yeah. And I love the pool because they had, like, you know, tons of slush puppies and the best, like, nasty hot dogs you can imagine. And there was a pool and all that. I think I told you the story about Swim League, the swim team where I was the worst swimmer on it. But I also tried to golf for a couple of summers,

and it just didn't take it up. But I was back in Toledo a couple of years ago, I think right before our Cleveland show, and I visited the country club, well, I just drove by. And I looked, and the pool is now just like a green field. It's been filled in. Wow. The little snack shop has been torn down.

I'm like, something really bad must have happened there for them to do that to the pool. you know. Yeah, there's the, and I didn't get to go here much because it was private, but Hidden Hills was a big neighborhood near my house that had a country club. That's still around, isn't it? Well, the neighborhood's there,

but, you know, the neighborhood has seen its better days and the country club and golf course is completely just shut down and grown over. It's really, it looks, well, it is an abandoned place. That's so cool. It is kind of cool. And then I had the idea of a movie

like a old school type thing where a bunch of old a bunch of like middle-aged men that grew up there go back and raise some money and try and like clean the place up and get it going again yeah to hilarity there has to be like a greedy developer that they're battling right oh yeah so is that the neighborhood that we got kicked out of when we tried to go shoot like without a license once around that area remember the security guard came up was like stop what you're doing

I don't remember that yeah it happened one day Was it on the TV show or a short? Some gorilla. No, it was like when we were shooting shorts, I think. I don't remember that. Yeah. I'm pretty sure that was the one.

Should we take a break already? Sure. Okay. All right, we'll get back and we'll talk about where many golf went from here right after this. Definitely should now. Charles of Reitcher, Rye, S-Y-S-K, K-F-N-N-A-K-F-S-N-N-A-K. Hi, Kyle. Could you draw up a quick document with the basic business plan? Just one page as a Google Doc and send me the link. Thanks. Hey, just finished drawing up that quick one page business plan for you. Here's the link.

But there was no link. There was no business plan. It's not his fault. I hadn't programmed Kyle to be able to do that yet. My name is Evan Ratliff. I decided to create Kyle, my AI co-founder, after hearing a lot of stuff like this from OpenAI CEO Sam Aldman. There's this betting pool for the first year that there's a one person. billion dollar company, which would have been like unimaginable without AI and now will happen. I got to thinking, could I be that one person? I'd made AI agents before for my award-winning podcast, Shell Game. This season on Shell Game, I'm trying to build a real company with a real product run by fake people. Oh, hey, Evan. Good to have you join us. I found some really interesting data on adoption rates for AI agents and small to medium businesses.

Listen to Shell Game on the IHeart Radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Danny Shapiro, host of the hit podcast Family Secrets. We were in the car, like a rolling stone came on, and he said, there's a line in there about your mother. And I said, what? What I would do if I didn't feel like I was being accepted is shoes and identity that other people can't have. I knew something had happened to me in the middle of the night, but I couldn't hold on to what had happened. These are just a few of the moving and important stories I'll be holding space for. on my upcoming 13th season of Family Secrets.

Whether you've been on this journey with me from season one or just joining the Family Secrets family, we're so happy to have you with us. I'll dive deep into the incredible power of secrets, the ones that shape our identities, test our relationships, and ultimately reveal who we truly are. Listen to Family Secrets on the IHeart Radio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. The moments that shape us often begin with a simple question. What do I want my life to look like now? I'm Dr. Joy Harden Bradford. And on therapy for Black Girls, we create space for honest conversations about identity, relationships, mental health, and the choices that help us grow. As cybersecurity expert, Camille Stewart Gloucester reminds us, We are in a device of time where our comments are weaponized against us. And so what we find is a lot of black women are standing up and speaking out because they feel the brunt of the pain.

Each week, we explore the tools and insights that help you move with purpose, whether you're navigating something new or returning to yourself. If you're ready for thoughtful guidance and grounded support, this is the place for you. Listen to Therapy for Black Girls on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. S-K-S-K-K-K-K-K-K-K-T-T-B-T-T-F-E-E should know. All right, so we're back. Nothing we've talked about right now constitutes miniature golf in the mind of anybody who hears the words miniature golf, right? True. Like what comes to mind are things like Put-Put or Goofy Golf or Windmills or Clowns or Happy Gilmore or something like that, right?

Yeah. So that all started Actually that didn't quite start yet It was really leading up to that And then I realized we had to keep going with regular miniature golf One more time Because it has to spread to America And it did

And we can actually trace that too To the house of a guy named James Barber Who is an immigrant from England Who was familiar with the course The Ladies Pudding Club at St. Andrews And he was rich enough that he said You know, I want a miniature golf course built on my estate at Pinehurst, North Carolina. And he did.

He had like an 18-hole miniature course built right there in his formal gardens, and it's just absolutely beautiful. It is nice. And this was the first one in the United States. And as it's called Thistledew, T-H-I-S-T-L-E-D-H-U. And supposedly, as legend goes, when he first saw it, he said this will do. I guess he was He was not blown away maybe I don't know

It sounds a little underwhelmed He wasn't one of those spoiled brat You know robber barons And instead was like this'll do This'll do quite nicely And they just left off the second part You know Yeah but it's called this'll do

And they started hosting competitions A couple of years later And I think this is the first time Miniature Golf was ever used Like those words were ever used To describe the Pine was that the newspaper I guess yeah it's their one claim to fame oh you know it's true though that's probably true yeah but they were the in that in a account of the competition they coined the

term miniature golf up to that point a lot of people had called it lilliputian golf sure after the the the little people in gulliver's travels yeah and that actually that name actually stuck for quite a while. So we've got James Barber who hosted or built the first miniature golf course in America. But still, this thing is like directly connected to the ladies putting club of St. Andrews. It's a golf course in miniature. We still haven't quite reached what we would consider miniature golf. And that wouldn't happen until 1926, which turned out to be a really big year for miniature

golf in America. It was like there was something in the air, and a few different people kind of tapped into it around the same time, and it suddenly just took off like a rocket. Yeah, two of the guys were some entrepreneurs named Drake, Delanoi, I guess. Great name. John Ledbetter, another good name. It's okay. He sounds like he'll shoot you. He'll Ledbetter? Yeah. Yeah. I can see that. They did a pretty cool thing, which is they opened up a course.

on top of a rooftop in the financial district in New York. And that kicked off a trend. There were, I think, about a hundred of those on top of roofs. I guess it's before the big rooftop bar hotel scene. They had golf courses up there. Yeah, miniature golf courses. Again, though, those were like miniature golf courses. So, I mean, that was a big deal.

In New York, just 100 rooftop golf miniature golf courses alone in the 20s. That's a tremendous amount. And I don't think there's a single one left, actually. There should be. So that kind of makes the whole, you know, there's one on top of Pont City Market where the House Stuff Works office is. Is there golf up there? There's a miniature golf course up there, and it makes a lot more sense now.

Yeah, it's kind of like a whole mini-cony island up there. Yeah, I mean, I think I've only been up there when we had work events, and the only thing I did was the slide. I didn't know there was a slide. Yeah, there's like a, you know, You sit in a potato sack and go down this big slide. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I did that.

That was fun. Yeah, there's a miniature golf course up there. We'll have to play some time when the whole pandemic passes. Totally. And then later that same year, you said it was kind of a boom year for mini golf. Lookout Mountain, Tennessee in Chattanooga, which is a place where I think everybody should go to see Ruby Falls and Rock City. Oh, yes. It is a tourist trap, but it's actually kind of neat.

I mean the greatest of the great tourist traps And it still holds up too Yeah Get a pecan log Oh my God Those are so good They are so good That also supports my theory

That candy was perfected in the 19th century I'd never heard of the theory Newgate honeycomb Sure Pecan logs Was that I didn't know Pecan logs were from way back then But I believe it

Yeah for sure They're definitely old-timey So these people, Garnett and Frida Carter, they built a resort called Fairyland Club. And it was part of that whole sort of interconnected scene there with Rock City and Ruby Falls. And they built a miniature golf course. And they said, you know what? If you like golf, maybe you should try mini golf because it doesn't take very long. It'll kind of scratch that itch if you're not able to play a real round.

and that's sort of how they marketed it at first. And they were the first people, I think, to start adding the obstacles, right? They did, yeah. And they used, as they were building, like, the inn and the resort complex, they used some of the construction materials like drain pipes and, you know, barrels and things like that, and built them as hazards. And then because they had this whole, like, fairy tale theme going up there, they also built Rock City.

They were the ones who built Rock City. And that has like a cool little weird, weird, but also very neat, fairy tale theme kind of hidden throughout. They added that to their miniature golf course. So they had these stationary obstacles and hazards that they added. And then they also added this statuary of cute little, you know, mother goose type stuff. And they actually called the whole thing Tom Thumb Golf. And Tom Thumb, from what I understand, is the earliest recorded English fairy tale character from back in 1621. And he was a little tiny guy the size of his father's thumb, which is where he got his name.

So it was a pretty appropriate name. They must have really, like, been pretty pleased with themselves when they decided to call it Tom Thumb Golf because it really, it checked all the boxes. Yeah, and we should mention, too, we keep saying Rock City. And if you're not from the southeast, you might think it's just some, like, red-knack. area with a bunch of rocks it's actually a very sweet natural wonder it's caves that you walk through

caves it's huge boulders being held up by much much smaller boulders yeah it's really neat in that way for probably tens of thousands of years that you walk under there's like yeah there there's little cave areas that you kind of duck into and they have little fairy tale scenes

with fluorescent day or fluorescent um yeah it's kind of day glow it's like glow in the dark weird like gnomes in fairy tale scenes like that's the weird part it's like if carlsbad caverns had you know some corny fairy theme and then ruby falls is really neat too yeah it's a very cool like natural attraction that they've done a good job of like underground water making it easy to to make your way to but yeah it's the whole thing is definitely worth going to And then, of course, they have the very famous, like, Sea Rock City barnsides that everybody's heard of.

And that was Garnet Carter, who paid one man to go around and offer to give a fresh coat of paint to barns all throughout the southeast. That's great. In exchange for letting them paint Sea Rock City on the side. Yeah, it's, if you've ever driven around the North Carolina, South Carolina area, and south of the border, you know what I'm talking about? Mm-hmm. South of the Mason-Dixon line? No, south of the border is the name of this

sort of highway tourist trap. Oh, no, I haven't heard of that. Yeah, it's the same deal. I think it's, I want to say it's North Carolina, but it's basically like a glorified rest stop that has a Mexican theme where you can go, like, I don't know, see a mariachi band and eat good food

and buy cheap Jockeys. The only mariachi band in all of North Carolina. But what made me think about it, it might be, was that they have the same thing for like hundreds of miles in any direction for south of the border and Rock City. They're very famous for these billboards that tell you like, oh, it's coming, you're getting closer, you're getting closer. That's really strange that I've never heard of that, man.

Yeah, south of the border checking out. It must not have been paying attention. So the car is built like this Tom Thumb golf course, and again, originally they just did this as kind of an amenity at their Fairyland Inn and Fairyland Club. But it was such a smash hit, and Garnett Carter was such a, like, born businessman that they were like, I think there might be something to this. And they saw, either they saw it out or he sought them out.

I'm not quite sure how it happened. But there was another guy who really factors bigly into this whole story. But he's very frequently overlooked, and his name is Thomas McCullough Fairburn. McCullough, Fairburn. Yeah. And he invented a really cheap and easy technique for creating artificial putting greens that could be used for miniature golf courses. Yeah, it was crushed cotton seed holes, oil, you would dye it green,

and they would come in these big rolls, and you just roll it over this foundation of sand, and boom, you've got an easy way basically to sort of franchise these things with these prefab kits that they had. and people loved it because it was when it was they called it midget golf for a little while not a term we would use today but it's what they called it in the 1920s right and this factors in to a lot of the stuff we've been talking about the 1920s lately just these weird fads that would pop up and tom thumb golf was one of them it was and part of the reason that it got out from lookout mountain is because the carters and fairburn kind of

joined forces and used his technique for making these greens very cheaply and used their kind of like touch of whimsy packaged it together and started selling it pre-packaged sets or prefabricated sets that could be franchised out to anybody who wanted to start their own tom-thumb golf course and so they spread really really quickly and like you were saying like the 20s they were just looking for whatever craze could come along crossword puzzles dance marathons flagpole sitting Well, apparently, miniature golf was the king of them all as far as the 20s crazes went. Yeah, this is a pretty startling statistic. In August of 1930, the Commerce Department said that there were, and apparently this could be low by even as much as half,

25,000 mini golf courses in the U.S., half of which were built in that previous six or eight months of the year. Yeah, that's a boom right there. Can you imagine, like, in eight months, like 12 to 15,000 mini golf courses being built in the U.S.? Mm-hmm. It's crazy. I can just imagine Garnett and Frida Carter just rolling around on a bet of money in their suite at the ferry land in. Yeah, and, I mean, in a legit, like, job-boasting market. Yeah, no, well, that's another thing, too, right?

I mean, like, there was, like, flagpole sitting didn't make the transition to the Depression, and dance marathons did, but they got kind of grim. Apparently miniature golf, and I've seen both, but miniature golf seems to have made the transition from 20s craze to, you know, kind of national pastime that made sense in the Depression because you could take your whole family out

to play miniature golf for pretty cheap. It's probably like a nickel or something. That was a big attraction. And then also, if you were like a golf junkie, but all of a sudden you didn't have the money to afford Greensfield, fees any longer. At the very least, you could go play some miniature golf somewhere. So it kind of scratched that itch to a certain degree. So there was like a lot of popularity that

even after the craze kind of crested and waned a little bit, it still carried on pretty thoroughly through the 1930s. And as a matter of fact, Chuck, some people were like at Tom Thumb Golf, the official franchise Tom Thumb Golf, it's a little rich for my blood. What else you got for me yeah like why can't we just do this well yeah exactly local entrepreneurs were like i got exactly the thing buddy you want to play half half priced miniature golf come on in like i've got a bunch of pvc pipeline around yeah or yeah so just basically whatever found objects you could find you you could you could come across what we're called rinky dink miniature golf courses that were basically knock off tom thumb courses that used whatever found objects the the person who built

had lying around. Yeah, New York had about 150 of them. Washington, D.C. had 30. One of those is still around, the East Potomac Park course. Yeah. And, yeah, the whole family could get involved. And I think one of the keys then and now

to many golf being popular and then put-putt, which we'll see here in a minute, is that you don't even have to like golf at all. You can hate golf and still go do put-putt, and probably have a good time. Yeah. As long as you don't take it too seriously.

Don't take it too seriously. No, please don't. Just relax. Don't be that guy. That's what it's for. You want to take a break and then talk putt putt? Yes. Okay.

Let's do that, everybody. Hi, Kyle. Could you draw up a quick document with the basic business plan, just one page as a Google Doc, and send me the link. Thanks. Hey, just finished drawing up that quick one-page business plan for you. Here's the link. But there was no link. There was no business plan. It's not his fault. I hadn't programmed Kyle to be able to do that yet. My name is Evan Ratliff. I decided to create Kyle, my AI co-founder, after hearing a lot of stuff like this from OpenAI CEO Sam Aldman. There's this betting

pool for the first year that there's a one-person billion dollar company, which would have been like unimaginable without AI and now will happen. I got to thinking, could I be that one person? I'd made AI agents before for my award-winning podcast, Shell Game. This season on Shell Game, I'm trying to build a real company with a real product run by fake people. Oh, hey, Evan. Good to have you join us. I found some really interesting data on adoption rates for AI agents and small to medium businesses.

Listen to Shell Game on the IHeart Radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Danny Shapiro, host of the hit podcast Family Secrets. We were in the car, like a rolling stone came on, and he said, there's a line in there about your mother. And I said, what? What I would do if I didn't feel like I was being accepted is shoes and identity that other people can't have. I knew something had happened to me in the middle of the night, but I couldn't hold on to what had happened. These are just a few of the moving and important stories. I'll be holding space for on my upcoming 13th season of Family Secrets.

Whether you've been on this journey with me from season one or just joining the Family Secrets family, we're so happy to have you with us. I'll dive deep into the incredible power of secrets, the ones that shape our identities, test our relationships, and ultimately reveal who we truly are. Listen to Family Secrets on the IHeart Radio app,

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If you're ready for thoughtful guidance and grounded support, this is the place for you. Listen to Therapy for Black Girls on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. podcast. Are we there? Are we there? Are we there? Are we at put-but-but? Oh, I thought you said are you there. I'm like, yeah, I'm here. We are there, Chuck, because let me set the table here. Are you ready? Yes, I'm hungry. America got a little burned out on miniature golf, especially the Tom. and rinky dink varieties. And so a lot of it died out.

But some remained, some hopped along. Some are still around today, actually. And by the 1950s, there was a guy who was playing at one of these courses in Fayetteville, North Carolina, which, remember, is the home of miniature golf in the United States, North Carolina is. And he happened to have just gotten a prescription from his doctor saying, you're about to have a nervous breakdown, I prescribe you a month's rest from work. And this guy, Don Clayton, said, can do.

And he started playing miniature golf. But he wasn't quite satisfied with it. Yeah, I imagine if you're on the verge of a nervous breakdown, then Tom Thumb Golf is a nice salve for that kind of experience. Sure, if you're charmed by all the whimsical stuff. And you don't take it too seriously. Right. From what I understand though, Don Clayton was like,

This whimsy sucks. We need something better than this, and I think I'm just the person to build it. Yeah, so he had the idea to basically make miniature golf, but without all the garbage, no clowns' mouths, no windmills, and have a little, like, have a little skill involved. Like, you can go out there, and if you're, like, a good putter, you can actually compete and have a good time,

and it's still for fun, but it's just not a silly, kids game anymore yeah like anybody who's been to an actual put-put course can tell you that it's i mean there's a lot of obstacles and it's interesting and fun and there's some neat stuff but it does it just does not have all of like the the moving bells and whistles that you're going to see on like other kinds of miniature golf like goofy golf no like the obstacles are usually just like some blocks in the way and stuff like that yeah yeah or like elevated elevated wrong or things like that or like a labyrinth, you know, built into it. It's not like a clown's mouth or anything like that,

which is kind of like the go-to description for Goofy Golf, isn't it really? Yeah, and I think like the craziest thing you'll see on a put-put course is where you, those that are like two levels and you can hit it into three different holes at the top and you're like, you kind of take a little bit of a gamble as to where it's going to come out on the bottom. Sure. It'll either come out close to the hole so you can get that part

two, and I think they're all par twos on a real put-putt course. Right. Or it'll spit you out way far away. But you still have a chance to hit that long putt for the two. Sure. There's always a chance for you, a second chance at putt-putt. I think that was the motto. So, yeah, but this was Don Clayton's vision.

He was like, I want to make this a little less goofy. I want to make it a little more interesting and skillful. Less goofy, more golfy. Yeah, yeah, Chuck. Man, he just sat up from his grave going, I wish I'd thought of that. Is he dead? Yeah, he died in 1996. Yeah, okay.

But he had a good run. I mean, this is 1954 when he was a 28-year-old man that he decided to try this. So he went to his dad and said, hey, I've got this idea. Rather than basically, as a New York Times obituary put it, rather than basically making a human-sized pinball machine for golf, we're going to make this a little more interesting. How about we cobble together $5,200, and we're going to build our own little miniature golf course. And he did in like a shaded little lot.

And with that $5,200, they opened for business. And within 29 days, he and his father had made 100% of their investment back. And Don Clayton said, I think there might be something to this whole thing. Yeah, so he was initially going to call it. He went to the bank to open a business account. and he had to fill out the paperwork, and he was going to call it the shady veil golf course. Yeah, this is hilarious.

As the story goes, he didn't know how to spell veil, I guess if it was V-A-I-L or V-A-L-E. So he just said, put-putt, and wrote down puttbutt. It wasn't something he brainstormed. Apparently it was just sort of on a whim. Yeah. And it's a name that really, really stuck.

It's kind of brilliant. And it's simplicity, I think. Divine inspiration, it almost feels like that it just kind of happened on a win. That's just absolutely great. But he started to kind of build the whole thing into like this enormous industry pretty quickly because he was right. You know, I did the math. If they made their $5,200 back in 29 days, that means that over that month they had 20,800 paying customers. Well, it was a quarter of a game?

25 cents a game, yeah. Yeah, that's a lot of people. So when they really got together and started Put Puttut, like they, he was right. He was on to something, and it started to take off pretty quickly. Apparently, at its peak, when you and I were going to Putt Putt, they were, they had something like 256 courses throughout the world, mostly in the U.S. and Canada, but also in Australia and South Africa and New Zealand. and it was definitely a thing. Like you said, all of the holes were par two's, right? Yeah, and this was just, to be clear,

256 doesn't sound like a lot compared to the 50,000 that they had in the 1930s, but this was his own put-putt-golfing games franchise. Right. There was plenty of more put-putt going on in the United States than that. Right, right, right. Yeah, like knock-off put-putt, right.

Yeah, like the one at Stone Mountain Park. Park wasn't a put-put-put-golfing games. It was just put-putt, but it was great. It was called Tap-Tap. They also had trail skate across from the Put-Put, which was a roller-skating trail through the woods. What? Yeah, it was like this two-mile paved, you know, just basically like a big paved sidewalk through the woods, and they rented roller skates, and you would just skate through the woods. It was really cool. Man, that's awesome. Country folk just have some of the best.

ideas for businesses, you know what I mean? I didn't think of us as country folk, but I guess it kind of was. Roller skating through the woods is country. I guess it is. That's like Dolly Parton-level country. So, yeah, they're all part-toos, and it is tough. It's challenging. Apparently, in the 65-year history of Puttut, there have only been three perfect games

where you walk away with a score of 18, which is, that's really tough to do. I mean, like, of the millions and millions of putt putt that people have played, only three people have ever, ever gotten a perfect game, which kind of shows you how, like, deceptively hard a put-put course is, you know? Like, each one of those courses is made of, I think they have something like 108 trademarked holes. Right. Or, like, lanes, I think, is what they're called in miniature golf,

to where you can just kind of take them and reconfigure them into different configurations. But they have 108 total and I guess each one of them is very, very difficult. I don't ever remember getting a perfect game or even imagining that I was going to get a perfect game.

No, I mean, you get two or three holes in one and that's a good day. For sure. So 18, there's actually a short, I think seven and a half minute Grant Land documentary on the most recent perfect puppet. putt game by a guy named Rick Baird who had his perfect game in 2011 can you imagine the tension on

hole 18 they capture it really well in this in this documentary it's really well done they've got like it like a cartoon version of him putting and he's got like cartoon sweat just running down his face oh man really great but yeah it was very nervous and he did it and he's actually a miniature golf pro um in his spare time which we'll talk about later But there's, so he's from Charlotte. Don Clayton was from Fayetteville, and then Joseph Barber was from Pinehurst. So it seems pretty clear that North Carolina is the ancestral home of miniature golf, or at least the spiritual home of miniature golf, in the world, frankly.

I'm just going to say it in the world. Yeah, and if you're looking for the creators of the kind of mechanized courses, You can go to 195 in Scranton, PA with Ralph and Al Loma. Previous to this, you know, you had the putt putt, which just had those sort of regular obstacles. You had the Tom Thumb, which had kind of more outrageous whimsy, but still things weren't moving. And these are the guys that brought in these rotating windmill blades or ramps that move back and forth. And they really kind of kicked that to the next level. And they, you know, they went into business.

time they started mass producing these things like the actual components and sold a ton of them all over the world yeah i think like 5,000 courses yeah which is pretty impressive they're the ones who came up with what we think of now as like miniature golf and goofy golf with the moving stuff not a fan the clown mouth don't forget the clown mouth that opens and closes or yeah like you say a windmill um so it's kind of interesting that don clayton brought miniature golf back to its roots of being a lot more like regular golf. And then very shortly after that, branched off the Lomas, who brought it back to that tom-thumb roots.

So that whole thing, the evolution of miniature golf happened twice in just the same way. Isn't that interesting? Yeah, and it also came back full circle in the 90s with a return to sort of that original miniature golf because real golfers, people like Jack Nicholas, started to get involved. I'm sure there were dollar signs, you know, in his eyes.

Sure. But he also probably loved it. I don't want to be cynical, but I'm sure he made some money. But they have competitions. You know, there are actual prize purses. There's a U.S. Pro Mini Golf Association. They have their own little U.S. Open. I don't think they call it the Little U.S. Open.

They should, though. They totally should. There's the World Mini Golf Sports Federation in Germany. Germany, and they sort of are the body that standardizes the obstacles and stuff like that on, I guess, what you can have and what you can't have, which is kind of funny when you think about it. It is, but it's a pretty interesting list. You're like, oh, that'd be tough. Oh, that's hard. The sloped circle with a V obstacle?

Yeah. That's just plain difficult. And I think they should call it the teeny weenie U.S. Open. Welcome back to the teeny weenie U.S. Open. I was looking at the U.S. Pro Minigolf Association's website, and there was a Tennessee State Open. And, man, the picture that they have of that course, it looks serious, dude.

Yeah. So, like, if you go to Puppet and you always were like, I love this, this is so challenging. I can score, like, a 16, or I guess not a 16. I just don't play the last two holes when I'm on a streak. You know, like a 20 or a 22 or something. like that you might actually have fun being a miniature golf pro and there are some serious courses out there for you to play that are a couple of notches above your average putt putt

course i'd like to play one of those would you i don't know if i would have fun i'd make a run club should we talk about some of these famous courses yeah so um from what i can tell the united states is the home of miniature golf it's the capital Of the capital of miniature golf. I don't believe there's any country. Like I was looking at it, I was like maybe Thailand is like even more into it than the United States. Right. I don't think so.

I think the United States is the place that has the most miniature golf courses and has probably the most paying customers for miniature golf courses. I could see Japan. I could too, but I didn't see anything like that. Yeah, I didn't see anything like it. So the United States is the home of miniature golf. And the world capital of miniature golf then is murder. Beach, South Carolina, which is ironic that it's not North Carolina, but it's not everybody. I'm sorry.

Yeah, I mean, Myrtle Beach is sort of one of those classic old school beach towns that has all of the go-carts and the bumper boats and the mini-golf, and they have one called Moulton Mountain that's pretty cool. Like, you should go check out pictures of some of these places. There are a lot of fun. That has a volcano, a working volcano that erupts every half hour, and it's sort of an inside and an out thing. Like, I think it's both. indoors and outdoors right it is yeah it's a pretty it's a pretty great one and the the whole volcano thing they're not the only one that's how nutso myrtle beach is there's another one called hawaiian rumble that also has a functioning volcano too and in fact on highway 17 there's a 30

mile stretch of it that goes through myrtle beach where there's 50 more than 50 miniature golf courses in a 30 mile stretch yeah and i'm sure a lot of opinions on which ones are good and which ones stink Yeah. There's one I want to go to in Palantine, Illinois. I think I saw a couple of these from travel and leisure maybe. This one's called Algram Acres, A-L-G-H-R-I-M-A-Akers. It's in Palatine, Illinois. And it's a funeral home, like, for real, in real life. Yeah, like, you know, they take care of dead bodies. And you can also play nine holes on their death-themed course in the basement. in the basement. First of all, the basement of a funeral home is just creepy on its own.

But a death-themed miniature golf course in a funeral home that actually functions that's just downright interesting. Yeah, there's this one in Las Vegas, too, the Kiss-themed one, which I checked out on YouTube. I would play this, even though it goes against two things for me, which is not into indoor miniature golf.

I really would like to be outside. and I think Kiss sucks What? I thought you were a kiss fan No Oh man I thought you were a Kiss fan No not a Kiss fan Never I mean you know I get it And I think it's kind of fun and funny

Sure But I never thought Kiss was like Played good rock and roll songs really That's very surprising I know Kiss fans are gonna be so mad at me For saying their music is not good But I mean there's a reason they'd dressed up And spit blood and stuff

So there's a But still it'd be worth worth playing. I agree. No, it looked fun. The one that I would actually travel to go play is called Parking. It's in Lincolnshire, Illinois. So I'd probably go there and then I dip down or dip up. I'm not sure.

It's a Palantyne to play at Algar Makers. Okay. But Parking is like exactly what, it's the pinnacle of a miniature golf course, if you ask me. It's got it all. It's difficult, and it has all of the amazing obstacles and weird traps. in functioning problems to figure out that a miniature golf course should have. It looked pretty cool.

I mean, I'm a put-put guy, but I was checking out pictures and stuff. I would go to parking with you, for sure. Okay, we'll go. It's going to be a summer trip in 2022 or three. Fantastic. And then if you want to play... So I think, Chuck, this one would be up your alley.

It's called Golf Gardens on Catalina Island in SoCal. Yeah, right at my alley. this one is like considered the hardest miniature golf course in the united states um not just because it uh it's difficultly laid out but also because it's been played so much that's got all sorts of weird notches and stuff that's not supposed to be there in the playing surface so that makes it all the more difficult which is kind of neat i love that and then if you want to go retro i think that one's been around a while um you can go down to florida and they have a historic mini golf trail that takes you from a miniature golf course,

a miniature golf course, all of which have been around for at least 50 years. Amazing. And if you like weird, old stuff that's not in use anymore, look up abandoned miniature golf courses. That's a fun thing to do. And since I said it's a fun thing to do, everybody, that means it's time for listener mail. All right, I'm going to call this dad mail.

Got this very sweet email. I love it when the family's listening, you know. sure especially when they're not i mean i like families with young kids that listen but i also like it when it's adults and then older parents that are listening right hey guys hope you're hanging in there these are such tricky times i know you're i'm not the only listener that turns to your show for a distraction or a soundtrack to washing dishes or background noise while trying to run or just something that feels normal during these abnormal times a couple of years ago my now husband and i took a road trip with my parents to stay with my now in-laws as we pulled out of the

driveway, we put on stuff you should know and spent the entire journey sharing your catalog with them, and they were immediately hooked. My parents continue to love your podcast, but every time my dad refers to it, he mixes up the name. I love this stuff. So far, he's called you guys you should know. Sure. Stuff you ought to know. Yeah. Things you need to know. And stuff guys. Stuff guys is, that's a good nickname. Lately, he's just been referring to you as the guy. podcast, which is close enough for me. Eventually, we're just going to get to the. Yeah.

Thanks for all the amazing work and the thoughtful approach you have to podcasting, so grateful to have multiple episodes to listen to every week. That is from Maribeth, and she says, P.S., I should add that the episode on fractals is now infamously nap-inducing in my family, but I blame the long stretch of highway on that. Thank you. That was very kind of you. Yeah, nice safe. really pulled it out at the end there.

Who is that, Maribeth? Yep. Well, if you want to be like Maribeth and get in touch with us, we would appreciate that. Right now, you can send it to us via email. It's the best way to reach us at stuffpodcast at iHeartRadio.com. Stuff you should know is a production of IHeartRadio. For more podcasts, My Heart Radio, visit the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Hi, Kyle. Could you draw up a quick document with the basic business plan? Just one page as a Google Doc and send me the link. Thanks.

Hey, just finished drawing up that quick one page business plan for you. Here's the link. But there was no link. There was no business plan. I hadn't programmed Kyle to be able to do that yet. I'm Evan Ratliff here with a story of entrepreneurship in the AI age. Listen as I attempt to build a real startup run by fake people. Check out the second season of my podcast, Shell Game, on the IHeart Radio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Whether it is getting swatted or just hateful messages online, there is a lot of harm and even just reading the comments. That's cybersecurity expert Camille Stewart Gloucester on the Therapy for Black Girls podcast. Every season is a chance to grow. And the Therapy for Black Girls podcast is here to walk with you.

I'm Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, and each week we dive into real conversations that help you. moved with more clarity and confidence. This episode, we're breaking down what really happens to your information online and how to protect yourself with intention. Listen to therapy for black girls on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Dr. Laurie Santos from the Happiness Lab here. It's the season of giving. And this year, my podcast, The Happiness Lab, is partnering with Give Directly, a nonprofit that provides people in extreme poverty with the cash they need as part of the Pods Fight Poverty campaign. Our goal this year is to raise $1 million, which will bring over 700 families out of extreme poverty. Your donation will put cash directly

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