Sir Stanley Cochrane b. 19 September 1877

The Cantrell and Cochrane mineral water company had made Sir Stanley Cochrane a very wealty man. The Company was originally founded in by T.J. Cantrell for the purpose of making and distributing mineral waters and aerated sarsaparilla and together Stanley's father, Sir Henry Cochrane Bart, who managed the Company operating out of 2,3 and 4 Nassau Place in Dublin. Under Henry's stewardship the Company became extremely successful despite the stiff international competition in the industry.

Source: The American Golfer May 1923

Stanley Cochrane fought in WW I rising to the level of captain of the 7th Batallion of the Dublin Fusilliers, during this time his city residence was 45 Kildare Street which was also being used in the war effort. Paul MacWeeney's in his fiftieth anniversary booklet on Woodbrook gives an insight into Sir Stanley's lavish lifestyle and love for all things relating to sport and cutural pursuits. The lengths he went to for his love of cricket are the stuff of legend. He had his own professional cricket team playing out of Woodbrook estate hired Harry Shelton to coach them before the war. In the early days of the motor car in this country he was one of the first to indulge a passion for this new venture with the purchase of a Mercedes, later he would accumulate his own fleet which included two Rolls-Royces.

However it was after the War that Sir Stanley got struck by the golfing bug and not one to do things by halves, in 1919, he set about building a golf course (nine holes) on his estate in Woodbrook.

In May 1923 The Amercian Golfer ran an article entitled: An Irish Golf Ambassador, where it stated his intention to place Ireland on the golfing map.

In the early twenties (1921-1924) he was already promoting monthly competitions amongst the professionals and this was considered to have been having a substantial impact on the standard of play for professionals in the South. Sir Stanley is often credited with the early success of his protégé, Moses O'Neill, the three-time consecutive Irish professional champion (1923-1925) and winner of the Moran Cup (1920-1922). The Irish professional in the early part of the twentieth century were poorly paid and unlike their counterparts in the US and UK after the war they weren't getting the profit from the sale of balls. So there was much desension in the professional ranks as it became tougher and tougher to earn a living. Many professionals could not make the trip to qualify in the bigger events because of the expense involved.

While in New York in 1923 he travelled to Pinehurst Golf Club accompanied by Grantland Rice and Parker of the American Golfers' Association to extend an invitation to the Americans travelling to the British Open to stopover and play some matches in Ireland. However this attempt doesn't appear to have been successful. In October 1926 when Arthur Havers and George Duncan were playing exhibition matches in Ireland Sir Stanley arranged for them to play at Woodbrook.

In the following years he decided to move to England and his involvement in Irish golf tapered off but with the first Irish Open Championship arranged for 1927 he had set a foundation for Irish professionals being able to compete at a higher standard. Cantrell and Cochrane would continue to sponsor professional golf and Woodbrook, the club he founded, would play host to many of the major events during the late fifties, sixties and early seventies and would also host the Irish Open in 1975 after twenty-one year absence from the circuit(1954-1974).

Sir Stanley died on the 23 October 1949. More information available at thePeerage.com.