It is believed that Augusta National Golf Club purchased the Publix-anchored property at 2816 Washington Rd. in Augusta, GA.
Sources tell Golf Lampoon that beginning January 2, 2019, the Club will close this Publix location permanently and remove all signage from the building’s exterior. Canned food items and other non-perishables will be donated to local charities. Assorted deli luncheon meats will be frozen and transported to a food processing plant in Sri Lanka. In late March, 2019, the meats will be thawed, ground in industrial mixers with sawdust from the Eisenhower Tree, and pressed into pimento cheese loaves.
Golf Lampoon has also learned that the Publix structure will be transformed into a holding facility for a state-of-the-art, Banned-For-Life-Patrons Pneumatic Expulsion System (BFLPPES).
Undesirables at ANGC: A Brief History
For over 70 years, Augusta National Golf Club has employed Pinkerton guards to escort unwanted patrons from the property during Masters Week. Upon expulsion, these patrons had their badges confiscated. The Club began entering their names in an IBM database program in the late 1980s.
In 2015, Estonian hackers breached the Club’s firewall and deleted the names of thousands of banned patrons, freeing them to re-assault Augusta National with their egregious behavior.
Add to these the growing number of “Get-In-The-Holers” and other jackasses who will account for a majority of the gallery by the year 2030. ANGC concluded that it would need to employ 176,000 Pinkertons to monitor its on-course patrons. This expense was too great to bear for even the ultra-wealthy Augusta National.
Thus, the Club’s Expulsion Committee consulted with McKinsey & Co. to explore cost-efficient methods for dealing with the Club’s undesirables. McKinsey recommended transferring them from the golf course to an off-site holding facility. Once there, expel them once and for all.
Interestingly, one of Augusta National’s founders, Clifford Roberts, devised a system in 1939 of dealing with the undesirables. He hired the Acme Tube Company of Greenville, South Carolina to build a pneumatic transport system to remove the banished from the Augusta National Golf Club property.
The system was installed in the clubhouse basement and ran under Magnolia Drive. Troublemakers were hustled down to the basement, tossed into the tube, and propelled out on to Washington Road.
With tradition being such an important part of the Club’s legacy, it was decided to honor Mr. Roberts by improving upon his rudimentary transport system. Engineering and construction consultants were hired to explore variations of the Roberts system.
Weeks of running simulations through computerized modeling led to the emergence of a double pneumatic tube solution. The Club would purchase the Publix property at 2816 Washington Road and convert it into a holding facility. The building would be gutted of lighting fixtures, shelving, refrigeration and storage equipment. All “Buy 1-Get 1 FREE” banners would be sold to Piggly Wiggly.
The first pneumatic tube would be built under the Club’s Merchandise Center. It was thought it would be easier for Pinkertons to lure undesirables into the basement there by offering them a free Gary McCord bobblehead doll.
Patrons who ran, used 1962 “periscope” viewers, made fun of Angel Cabrera’s English — and other deviant actions — would be placed in pneumatic tubes and told that their free Gary McCord bobblehead doll was located off-site in the holding facility.
Upon arrival at the holding facility, Pinkertons would confiscate any of the undesirables’ Masters memorabilia and badges. The transgressors would then be placed in a second pneumatic tube that would run from the holding facility, under the city of Augusta, and then jettisoned into the Savannah River. Next stop: the Atlantic Ocean.
