News:

Welcome to the Golf Club Atlas Discussion Group!

Each user is approved by the Golf Club Atlas editorial staff. For any new inquiries, please contact us.


John Kavanaugh

I don't know exactly how long the period was between Ross and RTJ Sr. and may have recently incorrectly called Wayne Stiles an interim architect.  Who were the guys that passed the torch..
« Last Edit: December 01, 2006, 12:51:48 PM by John Kavanaugh »

Sean Leary

  • Karma: +0/-0
Perry Maxwell was one.

John Kavanaugh

Thanks Sean,  I'm seeing Dick Wison pop up now and then and this guy Ralph Plummer...What did these guys have in common if anything.
« Last Edit: December 01, 2006, 12:59:04 PM by John Kavanaugh »

John Kavanaugh

I would love to know why according to Golfweek the period from the end of WWII to my birth (1960) architecture was asleep at the wheel.

Sean Leary

  • Karma: +0/-0
Thanks Sean,  I'm seeing Dick Wison pop up now and then and this guy Ralph Plummer...What did these guys have in common if anything.

Weren't they contemporaries of RTJ, pretty much?

How about John Bredemus

Mike_Sweeney

John,

Orrin Smith a protege of Ross. He did Plandome NY, Bergen Hills NJ (formerly River Vale), Longshore in CT. Nothing outstanding but no turkeys similar to his boss.


By the way, you have broken the Jaka rule and started two threads in one day. Congratulations the GCA double standard lives on!  ;)

ForkaB

They were called the SeaBees and built bunkers that were non-aesthetic but lasted!

Chris_Clouser

Perry Maxwell would not be in this category.  

Press Maxwell would have been.

A.G._Crockett

  • Karma: +0/-0
Ellis Maples?
"Golf...is usually played with the outward appearance of great dignity.  It is, nevertheless, a game of considerable passion, either of the explosive type, or that which burns inwardly and sears the soul."      Bobby Jones

Doug Braunsdorf

  • Karma: +0/-0
As a whole, wouldn't they have been the architects whom worked under the 'Golden Age' architects?  I'm thinking of architects such as the Gordons, Mitchell, Wilson, and Lee, Maples, McGovern, but I might be mistaken.  Were a lot of courses built in this country during the war years of 1940/1 to 1945?  
« Last Edit: December 01, 2006, 02:35:51 PM by Douglas R. Braunsdorf »
"Never approach a bull from the front, a horse from the rear, or a fool from any direction."

John Kavanaugh



By the way, you have broken the Jaka rule and started two threads in one day. Congratulations the GCA double standard lives on!  ;)

Mike,

Someone has to start architectural threads now that is all I discuss.  Now in addition to the football and day dreams of a 12 yr old thread we have a one topping the page that is insulting to women at the least.  If I have to start multiple threads concerning architecture to compete with that crap I can only see it as a benefit to the board.  I can not understand why we continue to participate and tolerate the attempts of people who try to drive off our wives, mothers and friends with sexist pictures and discussion.
« Last Edit: December 01, 2006, 03:34:15 PM by John Kavanaugh »

Brad Klein

  • Karma: +0/-0
John, good question. I can only give a short-hand answer here.:

Most of the classically trained designers did not survive in the business (if at all) through WWII. Trent was pretty much alone, Langford and Diddle being the only exceptions, and they were not major presences or industry leaders.

Jones set the tone, and it all had to do with turning your back on the past and starting anew, fresh, this time with earth-moving and bulldozers. Budgets were miniscule, they used the equivalent of D-3s and D-4s for everything, no hand work, no small machinery, and most of the stuff looked manufactured by road builders, which it basically was. There were a very few exceptions to this style, but it was dominated by Trent, who became soo busy he simply replicted his own work everywhere, and then essentially the same formula was used by Wilson, Maples, and Cobb. They didn't usually build bad courses, just big ones with bland features and little character or depth. The advent of USGA spec greens in 1960 took all of the early art away work from creating interesting, push-up greens.

The rebirth of style started with Dye in the mid-1960s; he rescued an art that was asleep for 25 years.


Adam Clayman

  • Karma: +0/-0
How does Red Lawrence fit into the scenario?
"It's unbelievable how much you don't know about the game you've been playing your whole life." - Mickey Mantle

Brad Klein

  • Karma: +0/-0
Red Lawrence was a very minor figure, bounced around, did not help himself healthwise by keeping lubricated, but he carried the old style around with him, only found two decent clients (Desert Forest and UNM). I deal with him in the DFGC book as an odd layover from the old period, but he did only a handful of courses and only those two good ones -- one of them a great one, mainly by moving nothing.

Michael Dugger

  • Karma: +0/-0
With all due respect to Mr. Ks original question, are there more than about a handful of courses built during this era that anyone really cares about?
 
What does it matter if the poor player can putt all the way from tee to green, provided that he has to zigzag so frequently that he takes six or seven putts to reach it?     --Alistair Mackenzie--

John Kavanaugh


Jones set the tone, and it all had to do with turning your back on the past and starting anew, fresh, this time with earth-moving and bulldozers. Budgets were miniscule, they used the equivalent of D-3s and D-4s for everything, no hand work, no small machinery, and most of the stuff looked manufactured by road builders, which it basically was.



Brad,

Thanks for the insight.  I have always enjoyed driving down a road and taking in the lines of an expansive highway median.  I can see that in RTJ's work now that you mention it.  I had never considered why so may road builders end up in the course construction business...usually without success.

mike_beene

  • Karma: +0/-0
Would William Diddel fit here?Seems like he did midwestern stuff and also Northwood in mid 40's.

Kyle Harris

George Fazio? Though he was playing a lot of golf in the 50s still, wasn't that when he started building courses out of his Norristown office?

Lloyd_Cole

  • Karma: +0/-0
With all due respect to Mr. Ks original question, are there more than about a handful of courses built during this era that anyone really cares about?
 

Michael

Maybe not. But there maybe only a handful of of classic courses that were not renovated or 'improved' during this period. So I, for one, am interested to find out who did the renovation and who might have done the better jobs. Hopefully I'll have some W. Mass info later this year for the site. That is my 2007 project.

Allan Long

  • Karma: +0/-0
I would think Billy Bell, Sr., would fit under this grouping. Although he worked with George Thomas in the 1920's, he was on his own toward the end of the career of Ross until after RTJ had established his own career.
« Last Edit: December 04, 2006, 02:39:21 PM by Allan_Long »
I don't know how I would ever have been able to look into the past with any degree of pleasure or enjoy the present with any degree of contentment if it had not been for the extraordinary influence the game of golf has had upon my welfare.
--C.B. Macdonald