Pine Valley history Book...

[TEPaul]

My point in mentioning why so many may've thought Colt routed the course long ago is perhaps due to this Colt map that was recently rediscovered after being lost for perhaps up to 80 years.

Was it ever used? That's a good question. It looks to me like it may've been originally used perhaps for a time because it has those "fold-lines" on it that means to me it was folded up and in and out of someone’s pocket out on the golf course.

But it has none of the serious fold-lines that the blue/red line map does that was obviously used for years by Crump which would explain all his red lines of things he was doing and thinking about over the years. There was none of that on the copy of the Colt map we bought off Ebay. But again, there were some old “fold-lines” on it.

[T_MacWood]

Interesting conjecture regarding the legend of Colt & PVGC. Didn't Colt believe he laid out PV and didn't a number of others - at the time - confirm it? I could have sworn I've read articles written by Colt and others saying Colt laid out the course.

[Paul_Turner]

Tom

Comparing the Colt auctioned map with the modern aerial indicates Colt's 15th tee is in the middle of the pond only about 50 yards in front of the island tee Crump built.

What yardage does he put for the 15th in his booklet?

Colt's 14th drops down the ridge to a green site that's now underwater: where the pond curves towards the ridge.

[TEPaul]

"Tom
Comparing the Colt auctioned map with the modern aerial indicates Colt's 15th tee is in the middle of the pond only about 50 yards in front of the island tee Crump built."
What yardage does he put for the 15th in his booklet?"

Paul:

The yardage on Colt's #15 is 480 to 500. However, it seems to me that Colt's green placement on #15 may've been somewhat farther up the hill than the present 15th green is. The reason I say that is, oddly, on Colt's 12th hole drawing there is a bunker on the left of the fairway not far off the tee that is labeled by Colt "bunker for the 15th". This may've been a large bunker on the hill behind the 15th green. One should remember that Colt's #12 tee was below the ridge short of and just to the left of the 11th green and the 12th hole (Colt's) was considerably longer (400 yards) than Crump's 12th hole. This would then account for the fact that Colt's 15th tee was probably on the land that is the beginning of the present 15th fairway just behind his 14th green. That fairway begins at least 150 yards from the 15th tee over the lake. Colt's 14th green (a par 3) was from a tee on the ridge app where the left side of the present 13th fairway is to a green that would've been on the land that forms the left side of the beginning of the 15th fairway. Don't forget Colt's `3th hole was only 280-300 yards and from a tee that was behind the present right 12th tee. (You can get a confirmation of the 15th tee by measuring the distance to the old road that crossed the 15th fairway. Do you know where that road was on the ground?

"Colt's 14th drops down the ridge to a green site that's now underwater: where the pond curves towards the ridge."

Again, I think the Colt 14th green dropped down to what is today the beginning of the 15th fairway, in that same area of the green placement of that fantastic looking cape hole iteration that would've been from about the original 14th tee areato across water to the same green site. To go directly at that cape green would've been about 220-240 yards but about 300 yards if played along the hillside which today forms the nature walk from the 15th tee to the 15th fairway.

[Paul_Turner]

Tom

I think the 15th green site is at Colt's site because the contour map is right (he exaggerated the lines with the blue pen).

Wasn't Colt's 13th green site in that fairway ridge on the current 13th?  If you drop down the ridge from this position, for Colt's 14th, you're in the pond.

[TEPaul]

"Interesting conjecture regarding the legend of Colt & PVGC. Didn't Colt believe he laid out PV and didn't a number of others - at the time - confirm it? I could have sworn I've read articles written by Colt and others saying Colt laid out the course."

Tom MacWood:

Colt certainly did say he laid out the course---he said that in 1914. He actually said in an article in 1914 that he had the honour of laying out the golf course. Yes, a number of others certainly did say the same thing---at the same time--in the end of 1914.

However, that doesn't very well scotch all the physical evidence now available of what Crump had already done  before Colt ever arrived and also all that he did in those four or so years after Colt left.

It was you who wrote on this thread that some of Tillinghast's articles about what Crump and particularly Colt did seems fairly inconsistent over the years and especially with what was said in 1914. What was said by a number of people in the end of 1914 doesn't square that well with much of what was said earlier and certainly later.

Have you ever noticed how a number of articles right at about the same time (the end of 1914) said the very same thing---eg that Colt found the course and laid it out or designed it or whatever?

That same effusive praise was given to Colt in articles by Tillinghast, by Travis and even in the article by Father Carr, Crump's best friend, all published right about the same time in late 1914 or very early 1915.

Do you know what time that was?

It was the first official opening of the golf course!

Crump knew Tillinghast and Travis well and of course Father Carr was his best friend.

Did it ever occur to you that perhaps Crump wanted them all to say that and perhaps even asked them all to write that right around the first official opening of the golf course?

Can you even imagine why he may've wanted them all to do that at that time? He most certainly was never considered to be an egocentric or proprietary or egotistical man was he? No one ever said that about him, did they, and least of all you in your essay about Crump the legend? Crump may not have wanted notoriety, perhaps never and perhaps at that early time when he may've just figured he was considered to be nothing but a first time amateur architect which of course he was, particularly at that early time. But that most certainly didn't seem to stop him living out his dream everyday on that project for about five years.  

Somehow, I have a funny feeling you may not be able to imagine why that may've been that way then simply because you, like all of us are aware of what Colt (and others) said in 1914.  

But don't forget, after that initial opening in 1914 Crump still had about three more years of "everyday" work to go and when he died the course still wasn't finished.

Does that sound to you like someone just constructing a golf course to H.S. Colt's plan?  

But the real truth lies in the fact that so much of the course simply wasn't constructed to what it is pretty clear now Colt's input was.

At this point I believe it's very possible to accurately go through the entire course, hole by hole and almost feature by feature and assign to any of it who did it. I think there is that much physical documentary evidence that's been properly analyzed now.

[T_MacWood]

TE
As you know the original idea at PV was to have Crump and seventeen of his friends plan one hole each. That was recipe for disaster especially considering these guys had little or no design experience. Its true they appear to have identified some holes in the beginning of 1913 it doesn't appear they were able to come up with a full circuit. Hiring a professional to tie it all together was the logical move under the cirmcumstances. It appears Colt incoroprated some of those holes and rejected others, and in the end he was able lay out a very good golf course.

[TEPaul]

"TE
As you know the original idea at PV was to have Crump and seventeen of his friends plan one hole each. That was recipe for disaster especially considering these guys had little or no design experience. Its true they appear to have identified some holes in the beginning of 1913 it doesn't appear they were able to come up with a full circuit. Hiring a professional to tie it all together was the logical move under the cirmcumstances. It appears Colt incoroprated some of those holes and rejected others, and in the end he was able lay out a very good golf course."

Tom MacWood:

That's a remarkably simplisitc remark as to who was responsible for what at PV both in a routing and hole design sense. There is enough material now gathered and a reliable timeline to be able to attribute holes to one or the other or in some combination in a routing sense as well as the holes or particularly features that were probably the recommendation of someone else such as Travis, Tillinghast or Govan.

My sense is up to five holes in a routing sense are Colt's. At least eight in a routing sense are Crump's. Probably 3-4 are a combination of Crump/Colt in a routing sense and at least one could be Govan and one or two in a routing sense are probably Crump/Tillinghast. That's in a routing context.

In a design sense (bunkers, green design, shapes, slopes, contours etc) there is nothing I can see on the course that matches what Colt left there in that booklet and one has to realize those were the things Crump kept working on all those years. Those were the things that were all obviously the concentration of Crump and Govan's incessant shot testing and day to day work and concern. Furthermore Colt left precious little with PV that had to do with actual green design and internal contouring and such. His actual green work in the booklet and on the map was extremely amorphous. I hear you asked Wayne for a copy of that Colt map and that should be clear to you when you see it, unless you have little experience in analyzing old green designing.

And then after Crump died there are documentably 4 to 4 1/2 Alison greens, two Maxwell greens and one Fazio green. There are 20 greens on the golf course.

Actually Perrin's April Fool's Day letter to prospective members mentioned that eighteen men had been found to design a hole each. That was obviously a fund drive in the very beginning as it was awarded for the contribution of $1,000 per hole to raise $18,000. That to me really does prove both how non-proprietary George Crump really was, at least in the beginning. I don't really think Crump was expected to contribute $1,000 to design a hole or aske to do so since he owed the place anyway and appears to have paid for the golf course.

Another intersting aspect of Crump at PV is even though he did own the place he did not want to be the president of it and did not want to be involved in a membership aspect---he only seemed to want to build the golf course, and there's little question that's what he was involved in pratically every day for five years. In case it never occured to you that is not exactly what someone does who is simply trying to get a golf course constructed to someone else's routing and design who was there for one week early on and never to return again. If you'd like a quick primer on that technique, I suggest you call Geoff Shackelford and have a chat.

And as all those who were there for the duration of his life there attested that's exactly what he did do.

On the other hand, Colt's contribution to the routing and design of the course is now just about completely known, and in detail. I believe the true and accurate story of the detailed creation of Pine Valley has all the necessary material assembled and it's about to be finally told once and for all.

[David Stamm]

TE, for what it's worth, here is the passage I read to you over the phone in regards to what Fred Hawtree said in Colt & Alison's "Some Essays on Golf Architecture".

"Alison went off to North America, helped to finish off Colt's missing four holes at Pine Valley and designed another twenty courses in the USA and Canada."

I know this isn't definitive of anything, it's just another tid bit to stir up the pot.

[TEPaul]

David:

Interesting. I forgot about that, if you mentioned it to me over the phone.

I don't know what it is about Hawtree as a biographer for Colt but it seems the man got a ton of facts wrong.

There is no possibility whatsoever that Alison finished off the four remaining holes at PV to complete the 18 (those four remaining holes were #12-15). The record is chock-full of who was responsible for that and it definitely wasn't Alison. It was the Wilsons of Merion, their man Flynn, and Crump's foreman Jim Govan. The records of Pine Valley and the records of the Wilsons confirm that.

The last four holes were completed and opened for play in 1920 and in 1921 Alison was brought in and he produced a plan to architecturally improve areas of the course that needed improving and that plan and what was done is in hand. After that very little was done to the course.

I think Hawtree needed a competent fact-checker when he wrote the biography of H.S. Colt. I wonder when it was Hawtree wrote that biography of Colt.

[Paul_Turner]

I believe the toughest part of routing a course is pulling it all together. And that's what Colt did, for the vast majority of the course.  That was at least half the battle in building the great course.

Even the most significant changes at 13th and 14th didn't necessitate a major reshuffling of the routing Colt left

The strategy of all but 3 of the holes is similar too.  I'd say the holes that match closest in bunker shape/placement are 6, 9, 10,18.

I also think Colt had a strong influence on the hazard style.  The natural, ragged, "tear out ridge", sand splashed style that he'd been building on the heath at St George's Hill.  Big scale too, many of them 50-100 yards in size.  I don't think any other architects were building hazards on that scale so early on (1913)?

Of course then Crump expanded on this and developed even bigger waste bunkers on holes like 16 and 17.

[T_MacWood]

Actually Perrin's April Fool's Day letter to prospective members mentioned that eighteen men had been found to design a hole each. That was obviously a fund drive in the very beginning as it was awarded for the contribution of $1,000 per hole to raise $18,000. That to me really does prove both how non-proprietary George Crump really was, at least in the beginning. I don't really think Crump was expected to contribute $1,000 to design a hole or aske to do so since he owed the place anyway and appears to have paid for the golf course.

 

TE
It maybe simple but I think it explains why Colt himself and all the other commentators at the time recongized Colt as the designer.

Whatever the case regarding the Perrin letter....the orginal plan was to have eighteen close friends design eighteen holes. It may have sounded good in theory but must have proved a nightmare in practice. Calling in the world's greatest architect must have been an appealing alternative to everyone involved.

I'm not sure who tried to lay out those first holes (pre-Colt) - Crump or the group - whatever the case it didn't take long for them to hire Colt.

[TEPaul]

"TE
It maybe simple but I think it explains why Colt himself and all the other commentators at the time recongized Colt as the designer."

Tom MacWood:

I'm sure you do think it explains why Colt was hired but nevertheless it is a simplistic explanation and I don't think it does explain why Colt may've been hired.

"Whatever the case regarding the Perrin letter....the orginal plan was to have eighteen close friends design eighteen holes. It may have sounded good in theory but must have proved a nightmare in practice. Calling in the world's greatest architect must have been an appealing alternative to everyone involved."

I don't think it was a good plan even in theory and that's obviously why it never was put into practice, and the initial Crump routing and the note on top is proof it never was put into practice.

"I'm not sure who tried to lay out those first holes (pre-Colt) - Crump or the group - whatever the case it didn't take long for them to hire Colt."

Perhaps you're not sure who layed out the holes Tillinghast described before Colt arrived but Tillinghast was, and he was there. In any case, whomever layed out the holes before Colt arrived it is now clear to see what was done before he arrived, and it certainly is clear to see what was done after he left and what did not conform to what he offered.

This is another good example of why it's necessary to be familiar with a golf course in person before offering opinions about how it came into being. It is not possible to understand how well Tillinghast described the holes before Colt arrived if you've never seen the course.

This is a very good example of why old articles must be looked at in the totality of the events that took place and the timespan involved with the creation of a course like Pine Valley.

You seem fixated on articles from 1914 seemingly unaware the course was by no means finished at that point and that there were more than three years more to go of Crump's daily involvement and even then the course was not finished architecturally until 1920. At that point Colt had not seen the course or been involved with it for seven years. That's a lot of time and architectural work and it would also explain why what was said about Crump and his architectural involvement in 1918 and on is so different from what was said in 1914.

The creation of Pine Valley is one of the most interesting and complex ever and simple explanations like the one you offered from Colt in 1914 does not come close to explaining the story of its entire creation. Furthermore there is a lot of physical documentary evidence you're obviously not familiar with.

Again, this is just another good example of why simply relying on old magazine articles without any familiarity with the golf course involved or all the available documentation just won't do.

[wsmorrison]

"I also think Colt had a strong influence on the hazard style.  The natural, ragged, "tear out ridge", sand splashed style that he'd been building on the heath at St George's Hill.  Big scale too, many of them 50-100 yards in size.  I don't think any other architects were building hazards on that scale so early on (1913)? "

Merion had numerous large bunkers--of the size you cite at Pine Valley, around the course prior to 1916.  While they may have originated when the course opened in 1912, there is not enough photographic or archival evidence to suggest they were there from the outset.  Interestingly, Merion was being altered from the very beginning over the next nearly 25 years.

[T_MacWood]

TE
When you mention the Crump routing is that the stick plan with the lines going every which way? Are we certain Crump made it?

[TEPaul]

Paul Turner said:

"I believe the toughest part of routing a course is pulling it all together. And that's what Colt did, for the vast majority of the course.  That was at least half the battle in building the great course."

No, Colt did not pull it all together or all the holes in that routing. The two previous routing maps combined with his map makes that pretty clear.

It's no wonder Colt got so much credit for his suggestion on #5 because what that did is essentially knock out Crump's #6 and #7. By doing that his original #8 and #9 became #6 and #7.

I believe that holes #8, 9, 10 and 11 are solely Colt's and that two of them replaced Crump's 6 and 7 iteration and the other two replaced Crump's #13 and #14. What Crump originally had for #11 and #12 became #13 and #14 on the Colt plan and those holes were never done. What Colt suggested for #15 and #16 were simply parts of the holes Crump had in those two areas. Add #5 to #8,9,10,11 and it looks like Colt should be given credit for the routing of five holes.

So in my opinion, Colt should get credit for five holes on his own and perhaps take credit for parts of #15 and #16 with Crump. The rest of the holes I don't think Colt deserves any routing credit for.

And the "designing" of the holes (green shape, contours etc and bunkering) not much credit should go to Colt as it's all far too different from the way Crump ended up designing and building the holes.

#18 is Crump's routing (very accurately described by Tillinghast before Colt arrived). The bunkers on that hole by Colt don't really match and Colt's idea for the entire green-end was entirely different from what Crump built.

[T_MacWood]

Wayne
Ekwanok, Garden City and NGLA had some very large bunkers as well, but not quite as ragged as the Colt style.

[TEPaul]

"TE
When you mention the Crump routing is that the stick plan with the lines going every which way? Are we certain Crump made it?"

Jeeesus Tom, you've got a long long way to go in understanding the entire creation of Pine Valley. Instead of another 20 questions approach why don't you just hang on and read my report when it's done?  

[T_MacWood]

TE
I've been following the discusion over the years and IMO its useful to go back and identify what is fact and what is speculation. Unless something has changed in the last few months calling the stick plan the Crump plan is speculative.

[TEPaul]

"I also think Colt had a strong influence on the hazard style.  The natural, ragged, "tear out ridge", sand splashed style that he'd been building on the heath at St George's Hill.  Big scale too, many of them 50-100 yards in size.  I don't think any other architects were building hazards on that scale so early on (1913)? "

Paul:

There isn't a bunker on either of Colt's plans (hole by hole or the whole course map) that comes remotely close to being 100 yards in size. What are you looking at anyway----the course as Crump did it?  

The massive areas of sand at Pine Valley is completely unique for that time and Crump must be given credit for it (and the idea). His unique and original idea of having basically unconnected fairway landing areas separated by huge expanses of sand is entirely different from what Colt suggested for that course. It's time you stopped trying to fit square pegs into round holes vis-a-vis Colt and Pine Valley.

Only two holes at Pine Valley match Colt's bunkering scheme. #9 is almost an exact match as it was built and is now and to a large extent #10.

[TEPaul]

"Unless something has changed in the last few months calling the stick plan the Crump plan is speculative."

Tom:

You can think whatever you want about Pine Valley and what's speculative. It doesn't bother me at all because I know you just don't know that much about it.

On top of that map is the notation;

"Am not sure if the greens are marked on the map as I marked them on the ground----GAC"

What more evidence do you want than Crump's own handwriting and initials on that map that explains what he was doing on the ground?  

Research and certain attribution just doesn't get much luckier and more fortuitous than that. From my own routing experience I can completely commiserate with that note of Crump's. Sometimes it's hard to figure out exactly where something your standing on or marking on the ground is on a topo map with all kinds of crazy contour lines. But I'm quite sure you wouldn't understand that at first because I'm quite sure you've never tried to route a course on the ground and mark it on a contour map.

That's why I believe that attempting to route a golf course on the ground with a topo in hand is about the best instant education in golf architecture anyone can have. That notation proves to me Crump was laying the course out on the ground, and not just with a topo map. It also explains that just like my first attempts he probably wasn't very good, at that point, at reading the intracacies of some of the contour lines on a topo map.

It doesn't say some committee of eighteen people did it, it says Crump did it!

It just doesn't get much more definitive than that, although I guess for you it would be more believable somehow if someone wrote it in some old English magazine.  

You also seem to be overlooking the fact that as soon as Crump bought Pine Valley he moved out of Merchantville and moved down there, at first in a tent and then in his bungalow. Do you think maybe he invited eighteen men to stay with him down there in his tent and then in his bungalow to do a hole each? I guess that would've been a bit warmer at night than his hunting dogs, don't you think?  

[T_MacWood]

TE
Were the notes written while he was walking the property with Colt or one or more of his partners or by himself?

[TEPaul]

"TE
Were the notes written while he was walking the property with Colt or one or more of his partners or by himself?"

Tom:

This is good research material but what do you think I did---video and audio taped Crump down there in early 1913?  

He said 'where I marked the greens on the ground', not where Harry and I marked the greens on the ground or where me and eighteen other guys marked the greens on the ground.

For a guy who likes to call himself an "expert researcher" you sure aren't capable of recognizing or analyzing truly valuable research material when you see it.

But as usual you sure are good at unlimited questions of people and facts you just don't seem to want to agree with. Maybe you just can't take the fact that you didn't discover any of this material and these facts.

What do you suppose Crump meant when he notated on that map 'where I marked the greens on the ground'  

If we found a topo map of Merion with a notation on top of it from C.B Macdonald saying where he marked the greens on the ground what would you say then?  

[T_MacWood]

"TE
Were the notes written while he was walking the property with Colt or one or more of his partners or by himself?"

Tom:

This is good research material but what do you think I did---video and audio taped Crump down there in early 1913?  

He said 'where I marked the greens on the ground', not where Harry and I marked the greens on the ground or where me and eighteen other guys marked the greens on the ground.

For a guy who likes to call himself an "expert researcher" you sure aren't capable of recognizing or analyzing truly valuable research material when you see it.

But as usual you sure are good at unlimited questions of people and facts you just don't seem to want to agree with. Maybe you just can't take the fact that you didn't discover any of this material and these facts.

What do you suppose Crump meant when he notated on that map 'where I marked the greens on the ground'  

If we found a topo map of Merion with a notation on top of it from C.B Macdonald saying where he marked the greens on the ground what would you say then?  

TE
Not knowing when those notations were written, and with whom, forces those analysing it to speculate.

We know the survey is dated March 1913.
We know according to a Tilly report in April 1913 there were seven or eight holes identified (some of the holes described corresponds with stick map and some do not).
We know that in May 1913 it was reported Colt would be coming to PV.
We know that in June 1913 it was reported Colt liked the site and that a plan would likely be forthcoming.
We know at some point Crump made notations on the map regarding green positions.

But without knowing who did what & when as far as the stick map is concerned...calling it the Crump plan is speculative.
 

[TEPaul]

"Tom MacWood said on July 24, 2001;

“TE
Colt was no doubt well respected at the time, but not the heavy weight he would later become. He had only been at it seriously since around 1905-06, although his biography states he began 1907.

Tom MacWood said December 4, 2006:

“Calling in the world's greatest architect must have been an appealing alternative to everyone involved.”

Tom MacWood:

And you’re the guy who called Tillinghast’s remarks inconsistent?  

Isn't it interesting how some people change the things they say when it suits their preconceived agenda?