Who was the first to tackle a heavily treed site in America?

[TEPaul]

James:

Canada doesn't count because it's not in either of the Americas, North or South. All my Canadian friends have always claimed it's in North America but I've never believed any of them for a second. I know it's up there somewhere but I'm not sure where and I'm pretty sure it's not in North America. I know it's somewhere under the Arctic Circle but not by much.

[Peter Pallotta]

Gents,

don't know if this fits the bill at all.  I’d never heard of the course, and thought the NY Times reference to it potentially interesting only because it’s dated quite early, i.e. September 17, 1900.  The Tuxedo Golf Club:

“Nature has been lavish of her charms in and around Tuxedo Park, and the golfers have one of the most rugged and picturesque portions of the entire preserve for their special domain…”

Then, after noting how popular the original 9 hold course was, the article mentions the recent expansion to 18 holes:

“The new ground did not work itself into shape as readily as expected, and in the interval the club did not feel like opening its links to visiting golfers for a high-class test of golf.  The woods had to be cleared on some portions of the new links, and a prodigious amount of rolling had to be done. The turf, however, is now very good, although a trifle thin in some sections…”

btw, Walter Travis won the “Tuxedo Cup” that year by shooting a 71 (the course was about 6,000 yards, and played to a “bogie score” of 81)

Peter

[RJ_Daley]

I'm wondering who it was in America that first tackled
 a heavily treed site to build a golf course. Back then doing
 such a thing was a considerable amount of work that may've
 seemed unnecessary and an unnecessary expense at the time.

Tom, I'm guessing that tackling a heavily treed site then was not all that much different
 in economic considerations than now.  If the trees are decent,
it is a possible way to defray some cost of golf course construction with
the sale of the lumber.

I'll go along with the Tom Bendelow theory.  Looking at how many
courses he built by 1905, and on the general areas of land in Wisconsin, that I know of,
I'd guess he had plenty of treed land to clear, and sell lumber.

[Doug Ralston]

TEP;

Did you LOOK at the site I showed earlier? The area is hilly and forested. If they had some small farm to start with, they would not have been much in those days there. I venture much land was deforested, and, as suggested, sold as lumber. That was, afterall, the main product besides mining in that area.

Doug

[Paul_Turner]

Don't know about America, but near London, New Zealand GC is thought to be the first.  It's wooded heathland, architect was Muir Ferguson.

[TEPaul]

"I'll go along with the Tom Bendelow theory.  Looking at how many
courses he built by 1905, and on the general areas of land in Wisconsin, that I know of,
I'd guess he had plenty of treed land to clear, and sell lumber."

RJ:

Can you proof that Bendelow spent more than a day or two on any of those pre-1905 projects?

DougR:

I certainly did read that entire Middlesboro CC website and thanks for that. That's sure a possibility but what do you think the probably was that far back of golfers setting about taking out thousands of trees on a site the size of a golf course? Can you imagine the work invovled in doing that? It's not just cutting the trees down the hard part is getting the stumps out. I can't imagine them doing that that far back if they could've used a farm nearby for a course. But if some logging or lumber company did it for them that makes a lot of sense.

But maybe Middlesboro was the first heavily treed preconstruction site in American golf. From the sound of it, it sure could've been.

[TEPaul]

Paul:

I wonder why C&W lists New Zealand G.C. as Tom Simpson (1931)? That's not in the remodel category either.

[Eric Franzen]

How about Kebo Valley in Maine - next to Acadia National Park?

First holes (by Herbert Leeds) were completed in 1894. This overview shows that they probably faced a heavily treed site when construction started.

[Peter Pallotta]

Gents,

Just to close the loop on the Tuxedo Club. The original club was founded in 1886 by Pierre Lorillard IV; the original clubhouse designed by Bruce Price the same year. The original golf course however (the 1900 article mentions only that a wide range of amatuer and professional experts were consulted on the design) was taken over by the New York State Thruway. The new/existing course, in a different location, was designed by Robert Trent Jones, Sr.

Peter

[Paul_Turner]

Paul:

I wonder why C&W lists New Zealand G.C. as Tom Simpson (1931)? That's not in the remodel category either.

Tom

Simpson redesigned it and he is recognised as the primary architect now but the original was Ferguson and the course was noted as the first "forest" course.