Be true to your school; Agreed on Similarities

[Adam Clayman]

Mark, Thought provoking questions. From Mozart's "too many notes" to Vaudeville's "always leave'em wanting more" comes to mind.

 When a feature gets overused, usually in a predictable manner, after the round I feel like I never want to see that feature again.
 
Somehow I think it is all site specific and is a large part of the art and balance in design.

[Sean_A]

Rich & TomP

Isn't the margin of error tightly connected with blindness?  In other words, I don't think folks mind blind shots too much if there is plenty of space.  For instance, if I hit a wide shot I don't give a tuppence if there is a blind bunker(s) out there.  The bunkers and blindness had nothing to do with my poor swing.  Where people get caught up with TOC's blindness is that the blind bunkers are seemingly right in the middle of the best place to be.  At the very least if there is gonna be trouble on the line of instinct then it should be visible.  This is a situation which many people just don't accept.  I wouldn't hold so tightly to such a doctrine, but many do and not only that, many of the folks who do think blindness is bad equate it luck.  

Many will forgive the dreaded combo of blindness and line of instinct trouble once or twice, but TOC puts this situation on the player's plate an awful lot and very early in the game.  IMO, this IS THE MAIN ISSUE which divides opinion on TOC.  As Mark states, how much is too much?  For me, TOC steps over that invisible line, though I do accept it and consider TOC a great course, just not one of the very best.  

I do find it most interesting that given the favourable "expert" opinion on TOC, somebody has not tried to replicate TOC in full measure.  By full measure I mean:

-wide fairways scattered with countless bunkers, many of which are blind
-several blind tee shots
-an unusually high premium placed on the par 4s (lack of par 3s & 5s)
- many terribly penal bunkers
-massive greens which go a long way toward helping create the varied angles
-bumpy fairways which demand proper ball flight control and extreme accuracy for the ground game
-out and back routing

Why have archies only used the TOC model in half measures if it is so great?  Is it all just a little too much for any archie to dare copy?

Ciao  

[TEPaul]

Sean:

Excellent post and excellent questions. Of course the question has been asked practically forever why St Andrews, if it really has always been considered the prototype of all golf architecture, and such a great course, has never been emulated with all the odd characteristics you just listed.

Look at Max Behr's remark from another thread about it:

"St. Andrews violates every conception of what we think a golf course should be. It is now up to our authorities to prove the beneficence of the terrors they spread in the golfer’s way. But this they can never prove. The final appeal which a golf course makes is to the feelings. As I said at the beginning, we get out of a thing only what we bring to it. Mr. Jones brought the greatest golfing skill in the world to St. Andrews, and after he had been tested by it, it was sufficient proof for him to pronounce the Old Course the greatest in the world."

St. Andrews violates every conception of what we think a golf course should be!! Behr doesn't even say it violates every conception of what a good golf course should be, he says a golf course.

Does Behr mean that himself? I doubt he does. Matter of fact, I'm quite sure he doesn't, particularly if one reads the rest of his remark. His remark probably has to mean (when he says "we") those who he believes are taking golf and architecture in the wrong direction----eg people like Joshua Crane. It seems Behr may even be using TOC as the ideal model or prototype from which golf course architecture should never diverge very far.

(I would love to take a time machine back and ask Max Behr what he thinks of my "Big World" theory?).

But it's hard to say if Behr is recommending that TOC should be emulated more completely or simply be allowed to be left alone without alteration since it has earned it through age and some kind of ethereal respect---eg his statement about the importance of "Feeling".

But Behr also wrote an article specifically on blindness defending that characterstic in golf architecture.

But why indeed was TOC never more completely emulated if the likes of Bobby Jones really did feel it was the greatest course in the world?

In the next post I'll offer what I think might be the primary reason.

[TEPaul]

Sean:

Perhaps one of the primary reasons some aspects of TOC, such as its eventual width, was not emulated more elsewhere, may have to do with the odd and unique site configuration of many of the old linksland golf courses.

Simply due to the fact that many of the old Scottish coastal linksland golf sites were long and very narrow (that physical configuration may've been what produced the original natural bents and fescue grasses due to alluvial deposits spread sideways out of contiguous rivers) the massive width of play (after the gorse was cut back from the original narrow playing corridors) was actually a result of combined playing corridors of juxtaposed out and back holes.

Was that result (hugely wide playing corridors of combined holes through out and back juxtapostion) even considered when golf eventually began to emigrate out of the Scottish linksland to sites in other lands that Max Behr mentioned were not suited to receive golf and the "spirit" (naturalness) of the game?

Probably not. No one back then likely ever even thought of such a thing. And right there, right out of the emigration box, golf and its architecture was beginning to get off the tracks of what it once was, and for reasons perhaps not even recognized at that time.

And where was golf and its architecture heading when it first began to emigrate out of the Scottish linksland (probably beginning around the middle of the 19th century when railroads were beginning to blanket GB bringing far more people in and out of Scotland thereby creating greater desire to take the game home with them)?

Darwin mentioned that a lot of that early golf and architecture in inland England was what he referred to as "steeplechase" golf and what even Joshua Crane referred to as "cross country" golf.

Golf and its architecture was headed out of its original home of sandy, alluvial, tumbling and narrow coastal sites wedged between the coastal dunes and nearby inland farming, and off to new lands and its new iteration combined with open, non-narrow sites and hard packed ground of the recreational and sporting world of the horse!

Did any of those people who took the game out of Scotland to sites inland in other lands even notice or understand what they were leaving behind of the game and its original playing fields and what that would come to mean?

According to Max Behr's articles most likely not.

[TEPaul]

Sean:

To carry on Behr's evolutionary thinking about the game when golf was taken to these other lands and sites ill-suited to the way linksland golf had always been due to the uniqueness of the links land sites, man began to tear the component parts of the game apart and try to analyze what they should be---how they should be more logical and scientific than what had been naturally offered land-wise in the unique natural configurtions of links land.

Behr said:

        "But to transport it he had to commit a sacrilege--he had to analyze it, tear it to pieces the more easily to pack it in his mind. And, in so doing, he did not realize that what he carried away with him was the letter only, and that he left behind something intangible, that property of unsullied nature, innocent beauty undefiled as yet by the hand of man.
        "It was inevitable that the first review of links land golf should have engendered a type of architecture which disclosed a conscious adhesion to a formal order of things. It was not to be expected that the mind would immediately seize the senuous appeal of native golf. Hence, it was not considered in the construction of the first inland courses. The natural architecture of the linksland, passed through the sieve of the mind, came out utilitarian in aspect and mathematical in form. The novice landscape gardener cannot see the planting of trees other than in rows, nor the lawn in front of a house other than in terraces. The conscious mind delights in the fitness of things, in the easily comprehensible, and thus dwells on the surface of phenomena."


I believe what Behr meant when he said 'the conscious mind delights in the fitness of things, in the easily comprehensible' he was referring to what he would come to call "the Game Mind of Man"-----eg much greater definition in golf's inherent component parts, greater visibility and the elimination of blindness, greater fairness through the elimination or minimalization of the natural component of luck via the configurations of natural landforms.

[Rich Goodale]

Behr said:

"It was inevitable that the first review of links land golf should have engendered a type of architecture which disclosed a conscious adhesion to a formal order of things. I was not to be expected that the mind would immediately seize the senuous appeal of native golf. Hence, it was not considered in the construction of the first inland courses. The natural architecture of the linksland, passed through the sieve of the mind, came out utilitarian in apect and mathematical in form. The novice landscape gardener cannot see the planting of trees other than in rows, nor the lawn in front of a house other than in terraces. The conscious mind delights in the fitness of things, in the easily comprehensibe, and thus dwells on the surface of phenomena."

Thank you, Tom.  Finally you have found a quote of Behr's that is precise, well written, and cuts to the chase of what golf course architecture is all about.  I now realiise that I having been dwelling on the surface of phenomena for far too many years, and I am ashamed....

In abject humility

Rich

[Sean_A]

Sean:

Perhaps one of the primary reasons some aspects of TOC, such as its eventual width, was not emulated more elsewhere, may have to do with the odd and unique site configuration of many of the old linksland golf courses.

Simply due to the fact that many of the old Scottish coastal linksland golf sites were long and very narrow (that physical configuration may've been what produced the original natural bents and fescue grasses due to alluvial deposits spread sideways out of contiguous rivers) the massive width of play (after the gorse was cut back from the original narrow playing corridors) was actually a result of combined playing corridors of juxtaposed out and back holes.

Was that result (hugely wide playing corridors of combined holes through out and back juxtapostion) even considered when golf eventually began to emigrate out of the Scottish linksland to sites in other lands that Max Behr mentioned were not suited to receive golf and the "spirit" (naturalness) of the game?

Probably not. No one back then likely ever even thought of such a thing. And right there, right out of the emigration box, golf and its architecture was beginning to get off the tracks of what it once was, and for reasons perhaps not even recognized at that time.

And where was golf and its architecture heading when it first began to emigrate out of the Scottish linksland (probably beginning around the middle of the 19th century when railroads were beginning to blanket GB bringing far more people in and out of Scotland thereby creating greater desire to take the game home with them)?

Darwin mentioned that a lot of that early golf and architecture in inland England was what he referred to as "steeplechase" golf and what even Joshua Crane referred to as "cross country" golf.

Golf and its architecture was headed out of its original home of sandy, alluvial, tumbling and narrow coastal sites wedged between the coastal dunes and nearby inland farming, and off to new lands and its new iteration combined with open, non-narrow sites and hard packed ground of the recreational and sporting world of the horse!

Did any of those people who took the game out of Scotland to sites inland in other lands even notice or understand what they were leaving behind of the game and its original playing fields and what that would come to mean?

According to Max Behr's articles most likely not.

TomP

You are probably correct about the first wave of inland course builders - with some exceptions I am sure.  However, by 1900ish the cat was out of the bag and several guys cottoned on about what was unique about links and attempted to recreate interesting golf courses by utilizing interesting land.  So the break in the architectural timeline from links to heathland was minimal and without very lasting effects.  

I do think the width of TOC was emulated starting around 1900 - probably about when people started to realize width was an important factor in TOC's uniqueness and for the success of heathland golf.  Its further down the line that the gca trait of width is not recognized as essential and I think we are still at that point now.  Probably as many archies today know width is important as back in 1910, but there are a hell of a lot more archies about today.  

I am not so sure width will ever come back like it once existed.  First off, there aren't that many models of width about these days.  Most links and heathland courses have narrowed considerably.  Additionally, as it seems was Behr's lament, the attitude of pencil and paper golf or championship golf became and remains prevalent.  Perhaps the most influential golf body in the world pushes the "ideal" of championship golf by providing " a driver's test" nearly every US Open.  The R&A has been guilty at times as well.  I don't see public opinion changing anyday soon especially with concerns over future water supply and cost.  Perhaps the day may come where those clubs who want width will have to accept inferior conditions.  I reckon this is when mighty Pennard will shine as a beacon like no other! Assuming the course doesn't just turn back into the sandy waste from which it came.

Now, what about the really important issue of the line of instinct being not only blind, but cluttered with hazards.  How does the modern archie get around this?

Ciao

[TEPaul]

"Thank you, Tom.  Finally you have found a quote of Behr's that is precise, well written, and cuts to the chase of what golf course architecture is all about.  I now realiise that I having been dwelling on the surface of phenomena for far too many years, and I am ashamed....  "

Richard the Magnificent:

You are assuredly most welcome.

However, it is you, not me, who has finally found a quote of Behr's that makes sense to you. I've had this stuff for perhaps half a decade and I read it and reread it all the time. There always seems to be some interesting new thought or revelation that comes from it.

Welcome to the path that might take you to the sunlit uplands of true golf and architecture, my friend!  

Now, just one last little caveat for you. Do not attempt to be cleverly satirical with this stuff or it will be something like the very large jaws of a very vicious dog that will tear a truly significant amount of your ass off of you!

[TEPaul]

"TomP
You are probably correct about the first wave of inland course builders - with some exceptions I am sure.  However, by 1900ish the cat was out of the bag and several guys cottoned on about what was unique about links and attempted to recreate interesting golf courses by utilizing interesting land.  So the break in the architectural timeline from links to heathland was minimal and without very lasting effects."

Sean:

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by the above. For instance, 'the break in the architectural timeline from links to heathland was minimal and without very lasting effects'.

If what you mean by the break in the architectural timeline from links to heathland, that era could probably accurately be labeled the so-called "Dark Ages" combined with that other label sometimes called "Geometric" golf architecture.

The entire extent of that particular era, particularly inland, may've lasted for nearly half a century, even if the quantity of it ramped up bigtime from the 1860s and 1870s, nearly doubling into the 1880s and then nearly tripling in 1890s.

The significance of what happened in the English Heathlands around 1895-1905, in my opinion, cannot possibly be underestimated in its influence on what was to come---eg the great "Golden Age" of architecture, particularly in America.

I believe what happened in the healthlands was significant in that it was considered to be the first really good INLAND architecture to happen in the world. The model for that heathland architecture was of course the Scottish linksland, and a very belated reappreciation of what it was and what its naturalism really meant to golf and golf architecture.

So the Golden Age to come was most certainly a real reunderstanding (renaissance) of the signifcance of the natural linksland golf architecture via those first breakthrough sites and courses in the inland heathlands of England.

(We should also understand that the heathlands itself was not just a breakthrough architecturally but every bit as much an iNLAND breakthrough agronomically because the fact is underneath that theretofore gorse and heather ground covered land and soil of the Heathlands was a soil and drainage characteristic remarkably similar to the Scottish linksland. That characteristic INLAND had basically theretofore never been found or used).

Original linksland golf and inland golf in the latter half of the 19th century had had a most uncomfortable relationship ("Nae links, nae golf") but via those first few healthland courses it was all finally beginning to come together.

And then on it all went into the Golden Age of architecture but even 20-30 years later golf and architecture seemingly could not, and according to Behr, had not, shaken itself loose from that niggling problem that he came to refer to as "The Game Mind of Man"----basically constant mathematical and scientific analysis of what golf its architecture should be!  

[TEPaul]

Sean:

One of the real ironies, at least to me, is that during that perhaps half century known as the INLAND "Dark Ages" and "geometric" golf architecture, there were many man-made features appearing on the natural linksland sites and courses at the same time that were every bit as rudimentary, and artifical and man-made looking as what was appearing on some of those "Dark Age" inland sites and courses.

Of course the extent of them was never so great as on those 19th century inland courses because it didn't have to be in the linksland as Mother Nature had given those linksland sites and courses so much natually anyway.

But I can't see how anyone can deny that those batten and board sleepers that began to appear on linklsland bunkering could be considered anything but remarkably rudimentary and artificial (man-made) looking.

But why would it be anything different, as man-made golf course architecture was essentially just being born at that time in both the linksland and other lands?

[TEPaul]

Sean:

One of the real ironies, at least to me, is that during that perhaps half century known as the INLAND "Dark Ages" and "geometric" golf architecture, there were many man-made features appearing on the natural linksland sites and courses at the same time that were every bit as rudimentary, and artifical and man-made looking as what was appearing on some of those "Dark Age" inland sites and courses.

Of course the extent of them was never so great as on those 19th century inland courses because it didn't have to be in the linksland as Mother Nature had given those linksland sites and courses so much natually anyway.

But I can't see how anyone can deny that those batten and board sleepers that began to appear on linklsland bunkering could be considered anything but remarkably rudimentary and artificial (man-made) looking.

But why would it be anything different, as man-made golf course architecture was essentially just being born at that time in both the linksland and other lands?

[Rich Goodale]

Tom

Sorry to keep getting on your case but could you please clarify one of the sweeping generalisations in your last post?

Firstly, what (exactly or roughly) were the dates for that half century of INLAND dark ages courses that you reference?

Secondly, could you name some of the courses built during that time to which you refer?

Thanks

Rich

[Peter Pallotta]

TE
thanks for that excellent Behr quote. I'd read it once before, but like most of his writing it packed so many (excellent and subtle) thoughts into one small package that it defies easy recollection or use in an appropriate context.  One of the many interesting things about it is what's left unsaid but still clearly suggested. He writes:

"It was inevitable that the first review of links land golf should have engendered a type of architecture which disclosed a conscious adhesion to a formal order of things."

And, to me, what is left unsaid is something like: "But we are no longer novices, delighting only in the easily comprehensible and the surface of phenomenon; and as we grow into maturity we needs put away childish things, and embrace with both the conscious and unconscious mind not only the letter but the spirit of the links, with a living faith in things unseen, and a fervent hope in the power of unsullied nature".

Was this not his hope for the future of golf course architecture? Is this what happened?

Peter

[Sean_A]

"TomP
You are probably correct about the first wave of inland course builders - with some exceptions I am sure.  However, by 1900ish the cat was out of the bag and several guys cottoned on about what was unique about links and attempted to recreate interesting golf courses by utilizing interesting land.  So the break in the architectural timeline from links to heathland was minimal and without very lasting effects."

Sean:

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by the above. For instance, 'the break in the architectural timeline from links to heathland was minimal and without very lasting effects'.

If what you mean by the break in the architectural timeline from links to heathland, that era could probably accurately be labeled the so-called "Dark Ages" combined with that other label sometimes called "Geometric" golf architecture.

The entire extent of that particular era, particularly inland, may've lasted for nearly half a century, even if the quantity of it ramped up bigtime from the 1860s and 1870s, nearly doubling into the 1880s and then nearly tripling in 1890s.

The significance of what happened in the English Heathlands around 1895-1905, in my opinion, cannot possibly be underestimated in its influence on what was to come---eg the great "Golden Age" of architecture, particularly in America.

I believe what happened in the healthlands was significant in that it was considered to be the first really good INLAND architecture to happen in the world. The model for that heathland architecture was of course the Scottish linksland, and a very belated reappreciation of what it was and what its naturalism really meant to golf and golf architecture.

So the Golden Age to come was most certainly a real reunderstanding (renaissance) of the signifcance of the natural linksland golf architecture via those first breakthrough sites and courses in the inland heathlands of England.

(We should also understand that the heathlands itself was not just a breakthrough architecturally but every bit as much an iNLAND breakthrough agronomically because the fact is underneath that theretofore gorse and heather ground covered land and soil of the Heathlands was a soil and drainage characteristic remarkably similar to the Scottish linksland. That characteristic INLAND had basically theretofore never been found or used).

Original linksland golf and inland golf in the latter half of the 19th century had had a most uncomfortable relationship ("Nae links, nae golf") but via those first few healthland courses it was all finally beginning to come together.

And then on it all went into the Golden Age of architecture but even 20-30 years later golf and architecture seemingly could not, and according to Behr, had not, shaken itself loose from that niggling problem that he came to refer to as "The Game Mind of Man"----basically constant mathematical and scientific analysis of what golf its architecture should be!  

TomP

Yes, the break I speak of is that roughly 25 year period which had little lasting effect on gca was the years between 1875ish (about the year I consider TOC to be the course we recognize today) and 1900ish (about the time of the first heathland courses).  The light bulb really switched on for archies in that they realized there was no need to reinvent the wheel.  Loads of architectural models already existed.  It was now a question of getting the most out of the land by learning from past experience and how to use tools at their disposal.  Though, I would bet pennies to pounds that there were exceptions even during this so called dark period.  Remember, many links clubs were founded in this period and imo the nuts and bolts of architecture was already well in place by 1900ish.  So the period(s) before 1900 couldn't have been too barren!  

Ciao  

[Adam Clayman]

Enter C.B. Macdonald.
 A Canadian born Chicagoan, who struggled endlessly trying to impart the ways of golf visa vie TOC and the principles found there.

I suspect it was these hard headed Mid-Westerners, with their inherent desire to improve on others ideas, that took the first steps toward the wrong road.

Anyone who wants to re-live the early days of this website, need look no further than Tom Paul's posts on this thread.

Thank you Tom for your teaching and sharing nature.

[TEPaul]

I think AdamC is right---this has been a very good thread for those inclined to this type of subject on here. The thread has come a long way.

However,

"TomP
Yes, the break I speak of is that roughly 25 year period which had little lasting effect on gca was the years between 1875ish (about the year I consider TOC to be the course we recognize today) and 1900ish (about the time of the first heathland courses).  The light bulb really switched on for archies in that they realized there was no need to reinvent the wheel.  Loads of architectural models already existed.  It was now a question of getting the most out of the land by learning from past experience and how to use tools at their disposal.  Though, I would bet pennies to pounds that there were exceptions even during this so called dark period.  Remember, many links clubs were founded in this period and imo the nuts and bolts of architecture was already well in place by 1900ish.  So the period(s) before 1900 couldn't have been too barren!"


Sean:

If I'm understanding the above correctly there are probably a lot of your thoughts there I just don't think add up historically, but, frankly, I can't come close to proving any of my opinions to the contrary so maybe I should just leave it alone.

Rich:

I can't answer your questions in post #36 so maybe I should revise my "Dark Age" era estimate to more like the 25 years Sean mentioned.  

[Sean_A]

Tom P

I spose I look at the evolution of architecture like the evolution of a species.  Two (or perhaps more) distinct versions of a species can exist side by side for some time.  I don't think the lines of architectural evolution are anywhere near as sharp as you suggest.  Good stuff was being built during the entire period(s) prior to the heathlands, it was just in pockets.  During the heathlands period those pockets of high quality golf were just larger than previously - the poor stuff never disappeared and it never will.  

I think those pockets of good architecture were larger for several reasons.

1) Archies realized that basic models of good architecture already existed. Many of the best types of holes were already built.  What was required was that archies needed to tweak these models to suit their theories and to fit on different types of land.  The best of the archies were famously successful.  I think this pool of famous archies from the period has grown over time once people of our generations did a little digging into the past.  

2) Archies found decent land both in terms of features and playing quality to build inland courses on.  

3) Archies were able to take advantage of tools and devise more systematic ways of building courses (not surprisingly as gca became a profession - which is an important development).  

4) Archies began to create better designed hazards: land forms, bunkers, streams, funky greens etc (I use the term hazards as it was originally used) which added interest, strategy and aesthetic qualities to the game.  

BTW I can't prove any of my BS either, but it doesn't stop me from shooting my mouth off!

Ciao

[TEPaul]

Sean:

I just don't agree with most of that post of yours just above and here's why.

1. The specific art and craft of golf course architecture was generally undeveloped up until perhaps the beginning to middle of the 1890s.
    The likes of that small travelling band of Scottish golf professionals/golf architects who were frankly most of the only golf architects of that early time simply didn't have the time or perhaps even the knowledge to actually understand how to "MAKE" golf architecture that was decent, particularly inland on sites that didn't offer much of anything naturally.
     I think they probably had a far greater understanding of how to USE a good site for golf better than almost anyone else of that time and that may be why most all the decent courses and decent architecture of that early time was at coastal sites that was decent for golf NATURALLY, unlike most of the early inland sites that didn't have much to offer naturally.
       I'm not even saying those first early architects had no talent or latent talent, it's just a matter of the fact that they basically never took the time to do any single projects comprehensively.
        We have it from some of the contemporary close observers and writers of that time and process such as Darwin and Hutchinson who explained in writing that most all of that traveling band of Scottish golf professionals/golf architects (the Dunns, the Davises, the Parks etc) would basically come in for a day or two and layout a basic routing and then they'd be off again back to their day jobs---eg club golf professionals or just on to another single day or two "layout" process.
          Again, it's not that they may not have had architectural talent, they basically just didn't take the time to ply it in that early time. They did what they were asked to do and paid to do both of which were definitely not much.
         And I think that's the significance of courses like Sunningdale and Huntercombe in the English heathlands----Willie Park Jr finally took the time to slow down and apply himself and dedicate the time necessary to actual "MAKE" a few really good INLAND golf courses. Instead of a day or two on a project he actually took months if not a few years to design and construct a golf course and its architecture himself.
         Before that people like Park Jr essentially just came in and staked out tees, landing areas and green sites (a basic "layout" routing and then they'd be gone.
        At least, that was the process and modus operandi on particularly inland sites of that time that has been reported to us from contemporary observers who certainly seem credible and believable to me.

Can you prove that to be wrong to any extent? Can you even show any evidence at all that it was otherwise in that early time?

In my opinion, obviously all things have to start somewhere and for golf course architects and golf course architecture this was the time and the place where it was just beginning, and consequently one would intutively not expect it to be much in that early time and particularly if those men doing it were taking nowhere near the time to do it they did later beginning at the end of the 1890s and the beginning of the 1900s.

[Rich Goodale]

Tom

One rather large hole in your theory is that the Old Course (as we know it today) was more than 50% created in 1857 when they went from 9 holes (in and out) to 18 holes.  Virtually every green going out (1-9) was created.  Some of the greens coming back (e.g. 16, were significantly changed).  Vast swathes of whins were ripped out, grass was planted over heather and shells, fairways widened, greens improved, bunkers laid.

If that ain't golf course architecture, I don't what is.  And that was 1857, and what was created is the course that exists today and is as revered and studied as any in the world in terms of its architecture.  It is also a fact that many of the greatest architectural features (e.g. Redan, Alps, Foxy, Dell, Road Hole, etc.) had already been created well before 1890.  Many of the greatest basic routings (e.g.  Old Course, Portmarnock, Dornoch, North Berwick, etc.) had already been laid out before the turn of the century

You've been drinking Tom Macwood's koolaid, Buckaroo!  Maybe the next thing you'll tell us is that Old Tom Morris was actually William Morris in disguise!

Ricardo

[TEPaul]

"Tom
One rather large hole in your theory is that the Old Course (as we know it today) was more than 50% created in 1857 when they went from 9 holes (in and out) to 18 holes.  Virtually every green going out (1-9) was created.  Some of the greens coming back (e.g. 16, were significantly changed).  Vast swathes of whins were ripped out, grass was planted over heather and shells, fairways widened, greens improved, bunkers laid."

Rich:

That is not part of my point at all, and I've most certainly never denied that man-made architecture had not been done previous to those "Dark Age" inland sites, particularly outside of Scotland.

The first attempts at man-made architecture clearly happened in the linksland and certainly also on TOC. And those first attempts at man-made architecture in the linksland did precede even most of the first attempts at man-made architecture outside the linksland and Scotland.

Obviously, that's why it's probably been said, and reliably so, that the first real example of man-made golf architecture may've been Alan Robertson's 17th green and Road Hole bunker at TOC. Others such as Tom Morris followed up on that in the linksland and certainly at TOC.

The point is linksland was clearly imbued with wonderful natural ground for golf generally speaking and could prosper for golf for so long without the need to manufacture things.

That was just not the case with most of the land used for golf in inland sites in England and such when golf first began to emigrate outside Scotland. Essentially most of those sites just didn't offer very much naturally for golf or for agronomy.

And when you add to that reality the fact that those first peripatetic Scottish golf professionals/golf architects generally spent so little time on those poor inland sites outside Scotland then it's not hard to figure out why those types of courses were so poor leading most in the know to call both them and their era "The Dark Ages".

But the real irony is that even with the first attempts of say an Alan Robertson's work on TOC (say the Road Hole green and Road Bunker) although they may've played great I doubt anyone would say they were a great expression of naturalism.

The same was true of another highly rudimentary man-made architectural feature that probably first appeared in this world in the Scottish linksland----ie the board sleeper supporting vertical bunkers.

That was definitely not a natural looking architectural expression or example and it's just so ironic and interesting that type of feature not only probably happened first in the otherwise wonderfully natural ground for golf in the linksland but was ALSO a man-made architectural feature that a Pete Dye picked up and used again in this country over a century later!  

[Rich Goodale]

Tom

You really didn't read my post, now, didn't you not (as they say in Lanarkshire--an inland part of the UK, BTW)?  As Brian's mom said, you are just a naughty boy!

R (Ach, what the hell, another emoticon, just for old times sake...)

[Adam Clayman]

Tom Paul's timeframe for the expansion seems accurate because of improvements in transportation technologies, like the Iron Horse.