Tom M.
I am sorry I did not get a chance to post this earlier. But I recall that you stated the chapter called Duffers Headaches was misleading because it merged two articles together. I presume you drew this conclusion from the bibliography which lists two articles -- one from 1920 and one from 1936. I am afraid you may have made some wrong interpretations from the bibliography. Substantanially the entire article came from the 1920 article. The passages from the 1920 Green Committee page, which appear in the chapter called Duffers Headaches is reprinted below. The paragagraph from the 1936 article is also reprinted below. As you will see the last paragraph is the only piece of the article that comes from 1936. As you will also see Tilly was espousing the placement of hazards beyond the range of the duffer in 1920 and preaching the use of diagonal land oblique lines in the placing of his bunkers. I think someone earlier so ably described his philosophy as clearing the center of the fairway.
I hereby request from Judge TePaul summary judgment in behalf of Mr. Tillinghast that he did not sell out his design philosophy. We also request the judgment be granted with prejudice.
32. DUFFER’S HEADACHES
Golf Illustrated, Our Green Committee Page, Vol. 13, June 1920
The golf architect devotes about three quarters of his time to the planning of improvements and extending old courses. Green Committees in all parts of the country are keenly alive to the realization that holes of faulty design and construction, monotonous holes and those which expose players to danger, must be eliminated. A featureless and poor hole has no place on a modern course. To be sure there is always an element in every club which is opposed to changes, but nowadays those who attempt to deter the work of modernizing courses are of the great minority.
However, it is very proper that the rank and file of golfers should be given some idea of the demands which the new holes will make of his limited skill. The player of very ordinary ability naturally fears that a stiffened course may present fearsome features to rob his rounds of pleasure. As a matter of fact the golf architect of today is a good friend of the duffer. Let us consider a first class two-shot hole for example, a hole which is calculated to call for a full brassey after a well-hit drive. The actual yardage of a hole of this type will vary with conditions, some turf yielding far greater distance than others. But let us assume that the hole in question is located on an inland course of average speed, and that under normal weather conditions the best players are compelled to use wood for both shots to cover the four hundred and sixty yards between teeing-ground and green. The length of this hole alone will place the green beyond the range of the duffer’s two healthiest swipes, and if the fairway were absolutely barren of hazards, the “three-figure” man will require three strokes and possibly more. His poorly played shots are vexations enough without digging pit-falls to add to his sorrows Yet on hundreds of course we find old-fashioned bunkers, marring the scenery at a point about one hundred and forty yards from the teeing ground, hazards which extend squarely across the line of play and which call for a drive to carry the trouble from crack and duffer alike.
Now it is safe to assert that in the average golf club there are fully twenty-give per cent of the players who cannot average one hundred and forty yards in carry, and a goodly number who cannot make the distance at all even with the long-flying balls of the present day. With such a hazard, many a player must of necessity drive off in desperate effort, feeling in his heart that certain disaster awaits him, yet hoping that some lucky chance may yield a fair shot for his second.
The experts certainly will give the hazard no thought. They can half-hit their drives and still carry well over. In brief, the hazards of yesterday trap only bad shots, while those of the present gather in the “nearly good” ones of the fellows who formerly hooked and sliced their long ones without punishment. We are building hazards, or designing our holes to include natural ones, in such a manner as to grade the carries, with suitable rewards for each successful effort. The scratch player is forced to hit his longest and best to negotiate the carry which will open up the green to the best advantage for his second. Often enough he is called on for a carry of one hundred and eighty yards or more, fully forty or fifty yards longer than before; while the medium and poor players have to contend with a greatly shortened carry and likely none at all.
The Professional Golfer of America, From the Gulf to Puget Sound, The P.G.A. Examines Courses, pp 22-23, June 1936
While, as I have said, the courses generally are structurally and strategically improved over those of a few years back, yet there are enough of the Cheap-John, amateurish sort, rather cluttered with sand pits that cost money to maintain for no other purpose than to discourage the very players at golf, who need encouraging most. When speaking of these abominations in my reports to the P.G.A. for brevity’s sake I simply call them D.H.’s (short for Duffer’s Headaches). I am thoroughly delighted by the reaction of green committees everywhere to our doctrine of the elimination of these relics of golf’s dark age.
