The Wrecking Crew (Wodehouse)

The Wrecking Crew is a recurring group of fictional characters from the golf stories of British comic writer P. G. Wodehouse, being a foursome of golfers infamous for their grotesque golfing techniques and tedious pace of play.

Overview

They featured prominently in the short story "Chester Forgets Himself" (1923 ), and act as a catalyst whereby the protagonist finds himself uttering a string of profanity in front of a lady whom he very much wants to impress.

The foursome consist of "The First Grave Digger", "The Man with the Hoe", "Old Father Time", and "Consul, the Almost Human".

"The Wrecking Crew consisted of four retired business men who had taken up the noble game late in life because their doctors had ordered them air and exercise."

The First Grave-Digger was "the star performer of the Wrecking Crew [...] He differed from his colleagues [...] in that, while they were content to peck cautiously at the ball, he never spared himself in his efforts to do it a violent injury."

tories

Members of The Wrecking Crew are featured in:

* "The Girl on the Boat" (1922) – novel, with "Consul, the Almost-Human"
* "Chester Forgets Himself" (1923) – Oldest Member golf story, collected in "The Heart of a Goof" (1926)
* "The Letter of the Law" (1936) – Oldest Member golf story, collected in "Lord Emsworth and Others" (1937)