Horse and scraper

[T_MacWood]

Has anyone attempted to construct a modern golf course using the old fashioned construction methods? A single golf hole? A bunker or green?

I'm not sure where you'd find the horses.

[TEPaul]

Tom:

There's certainly no lack of available horses--at least where I live. To do something like that would be interesting but no more than a total novelity today, in my opinion. Some of these really good shapers today on the available size spectrum of mechanized equipment could probably quite easily exactly mimic what was once done by horse and scraper. It's just amazing to me what some of these really talented shapers today can do---eg the very small detailing of ground contours.

Doing a hole or a course with an old fashioned horse and scraper probably wouldn't be much different from attempting to maintain bunker surrounds and such with a scythe which is what they did at Merion even up into the era of Richie Valentine.

[RJ_Daley]

I'm really serious about this suggestion...

I think that Doak, Hanse or Nicklaus ought to get ahold of one of the many Draft Horse associations that are in many states.  They usually put on demonstrations at county and state fairs, and they pride themselves on maintaining and preserving the old techniques of the by-gone era.  What one of these sand hill project archies ought to do is invite some association that has these old work horse teams to come to the site and they should get a very good film crew there to document how the work is done with horse-mule teams.  

Then, when someone finally gets around to writing the definitive screen play about the golden era or GCA, and the characters that were the master archies, there would be good film quality scenes to add to the movie as to the horse team and scrapper work.

[W.H. Cosgrove]

I just drove through Idaho, Oregon and Wahsington.  Horses are no rpoblem, there are plenty.  

Now all you need is a shaper with the ability to manage the team and the box scraper.  My guess is that animal would be much harder to find!

[BCrosby]

Talking to someone once who saw them construct courses in the '20's, he referred to a "pan" that was pulled by three or four horses. My understanding was that the pan acted like a kind of scoop. To smooth things, the horses dragged a couple of railway cross ties. No dirt was removed from the site. That was impossible. It was just moved around to the nearest possible location. I am convinced that many of the landforms and bunker locations on Ross courses were simply convenient places to either dump dirt or find extra dirt. Moving dirt more than a couple of yards was not feasible.

Bob

P.S. He also said they only used mules. Horses were usually too expensive for that kind of work.  

[Bill_McBride]

Bob, reflecting on that zero cut and fill plan (just move it around, no fill brought in, no cut hauled off), you can only marvel at the engineering feat the construction of the Lido course was!  I forget how many cubic yards of fill had to be brought in but it was monumental.  I wonder if some of today's feats of engineering and earthworks compare to the Lido project!

[BCrosby]

Bill -

Yes, it is incredible. Because they were going to end up with the same net amount of dirt at the site, any addition to elevation in one spot required a correspnding decrease in elevation at another spot. And vice versa.

It would have required much more detailed planning and forethought about where the dirt was going. You couldn't just say "shave this ridge" becasue the dirt you took out of the ridge had to find a home somewhere very close to where the old ridge once was. And that removed dirt raised a new set of drainage/strategy/aesthetics issues, and so forth across the entire site.

I wonder if at the Lido, because of proximity to Long Island Sound, they didn't use barges and conveyor belts.

Bob

BTW, at Athens CC for repair work they kept two mules and a barn just off the first fairway until sometime in the '40's.

[Bill_McBride]

I think I hit a ball in that barn one time!

Re cut and fill --- looking at a site like Talking Stick North with all those deep bunkers.  Given the cut required to excavate the bunkers, I'm sure there was enough fill created to build up greens and tees when you see how low scale the surrounds are.

A course where significant irrigation ponds are excavated would generate enough fill to handle tees, greens and significant spectator mounding!!

I think the fill for Lido did indeed move via barge and conveyor.  That would have quite a sight to see!

[ian]

Tom,

it took me a day to put the team back together but were ready. We've been having some practice runs here in the backyard. Where do you need us, and remember we work for food!

[Jeff_Mingay]

Ian,

Is that a photo from Muskoka Bay, under construction?  

[ian]

Jeff,

You'll be happy when I show you the grading drawings for Muskoka Bay. Even a horse drawn scraper would have no work.

[Joe Hancock]

I wonder if the architects were as fussy back then as it was much more time to tweak things. Today, the architect inspects, directs and the shaper redoes a tee complex in an hour. It makes for a better product...providing said architect has his...ummm, shall we say...poop in a group.

Joe

[Tony Ristola]

I'd thought of this a while ago for constructing bunkers in sandy soil. Why use horses?  Strip the topsoil with an excavator and then go in with the scoop attached to a 4 wheel drive ATV, or a very small tractor.  Would have the same compacting effect as they drove over the feature being built.  They are agile in their movements, and you wouldn't have to put up with an ornary horse and their deposits.

[moth]

Do camels qualify? I know a guy who built a golf course in Pakistan about 5 years ago and camels pulling big lumps of wood were used for finish work. Will have to check if they used pans for shaping althoug I suspect a lot of shovels were probably involved.

Its a big wide world out there you know.