For three hours on Tuesday, the auction inside Tam O'Shanter Country Club felt less like a sale than a clearing of a chapter. By the time the last lot was called, 93% of the items in the former club had been sold, a quick and thorough exit for a place that has already lived through more change than most golf courses ever do.
The Tam O'Shanter Golf Course auction took place at the former club in Glen Head, and the scale of what was sold mattered because it underscored how much of the property’s identity has already been stripped away. Gerard Trimboli, the auctioneer, said the three-hour event sold 93% of the items, a strong outcome that left the bare walls behind as the most visible reminder of what used to be there.
That sense of transition has been building for years. The 148-acre property sold in 2019 for $11.8 million to a New Jersey-based developer, while the golf course remained in operation through summer 2021. Plans to convert the land into a housing development were then delayed by toxins found in the topsoil, leaving the site caught between old use and new purpose.
A property stuck in limbo
Last month, property records showed the property sold again, but the larger question around what comes next still has not been settled. The Village of Brookville changed zoning to encourage the property to remain a golf course, yet the redevelopment path has been repeatedly complicated. Daniel Serota said the owners at the time let the application lapse, so that fell apart, before describing later plans as tweaked.
Tuesday’s auction offered a different kind of answer: not to the land’s future, but to the fate of what was still inside the building. Buyers and former visitors picked through the remains of the club, with Evan Hirsch recalling, “I remember sitting at that table when it was in the bar,” a line that captured the mix of memory and finality hanging over the sale.
There were also practical details that made the event feel unusually complete. American Auctions, Liquidations, Appraisals Inc. handled the sale, which included 16 golf equipment racks at $10 a piece, and it all unfolded in a little under the time it might take to play a full round. In a place where the future remains uncertain, the auction at least made one thing clear: most of what was left inside Tam O'Shanter is now gone.
