January 4, 1914 drawing: Pine Valley

[TEPaul]

"Tom
What yardage does Colt give for 7 and 15 in his booklet?"

Paul:

As you said above I do not have that info to hand at the moment but I'll get it for you shortly.

That is a good question anyway for the reason that I'm not too sure where or at what point Crump came up with this fixated idea of his that his two par 5s should be always completely unreachable in two. That may not have been Colt's idea but perhaps more an idea he got from Tillinghast somewhat later. At least Tillinghast seems to imply that in some of his later articles, particularly in the "Three Shot Hole" article republished in "The Course Beautiful".

[Joe Bausch]

And here's another one I've run into.

Citation:

Headline: World's Greatest Golf Course is Now under Construction in Jersey; Article Type: News/Opinion
Paper: Montgomery Advertiser, published as The Montgomery Advertiser; Date: 09-17-1916; Volume: LXXXVII; Issue: 261; Page: Twelve; Location: Montgomery, Alabama.  The author is Grantland Rice.

Here is part of the article:

[TEPaul]

"On the plan above, the 14th at 390 yards seems too long for any of the iterations we have seen (including the cape hole)."

Paul:

You can see that 390 yard par 4 14th iteration in stick line form only on the "Blue/Red" line topo but it's basically S lined out and/or Xed out along with the previous iteration for the placement of the 13th green which was about 125 yards to the right and short of where it was finally built.  

[Paul_Turner]

Tom

Also when does Tillinghast report on the extension of the 13th to a long par 4,  from memory I think it was much later than 1914.  

But here we have a 420 yard hole.

Also 12th is about right length.

[Paul_Turner]

Just found when Tillinghast mentioned the 13th extension:  March 1915.

http://www.tillinghast.net/cms/taxonomy/term/35

[TEPaul]

Paul:

In Colt's hole-by-hole booklet #7 was listed as 430-470 and #15 was listed as 480-500. Both make total sense to me seeing as where I believe that green was drawn on #7 and where the tee was drawn on #15.

Interestingly, on Colt's 7th hole drawing in his booklet someone appears to have inserted 540 later. That too would  make perfect sense as that's an increase which matches the distance from where Colt drew the 7th green and where Crump actually built it.

[Phil_the_Author]

On a side note... Paul, thank you for referencing the Tillinghast Association site and archive for the Tilly reference. It is for just this purpose that we've been working at getting his writings on there...

[BCrosby]

I was surprised to see Herb Fowler mentioned so prominently in the article. Crump is referred to as a Fowler "disciple".

Is that news? Is it right? Bob

[TEPaul]

Paul:

When Tillinghast reported on the extension of the 13th hole I do not believe he was as much reporting on the extended length of it but more on the fact of where the green site was changed TO!

The reason for that might be fairly obvious as Tillie also mentioned or implied that it was he who pointed out the new green site for #13 to Crump.

Previous to that the plan for the 13th hole had evolved from Colt's drawing that was a par 4 of 280 to 300 that had a green site just about over what's now known as Hollaman's Hollow towards the end of what is the landing zone of the 13th tee shot.

Before this January 1914 article Crump had obviously changed the 13th green site to a spot perhaps 125 yards to the right and short of the present green site. This shows up on the "blue/red" line topo and is clearly Xed out.

That iteration would've also left enough room for the 390 yard par 4 14th down the hill towards the present 14th green that we see in this article listed as a 390 par 4 but only as a yardage along the stick-line on  Colt's 180-200 yard par 3 14th.

[TEPaul]

Bob:

The revelation that Crump and his Pine Valley buddies were so high on Fowler and his architecture was total news to me and is a whole lot of the value of these articles and info Joe Bausch is coming up with via The Inquirer.

This stuff was clearly not being made up by some newspaper reporter. Obviously Verdant Green (whoever that really was) had been there at Pine Valley to talk with these guys and to see Fowler's plans under glass and all that.

I sure don't want to get into some big dispute again about Colt's role in all this but it sure isn't lost on me that one of these Verdant Green Inquirer articles in Jan 1914 also mentioned that Colt's major contribution to PV was the unraveling of the 5th hole and making it the great hole it is. On the other hand, I think few appreciate how much something like that essentially made the "jigsaw" puzzle effect of much of the rest of the course just fall into place because of that 5th hole alteration of Colt's. For that reason even if one hole it's more significant than it might at first seem and it appears Crump and his buddies felt that way too from what they apparently said to Verdant Green about Colt and the 5th hole.

Again, Verdant Green was clearly speaking directly to Crump and his buddies and it appears they're the ones who said that too!

I don't think this is any dissing or short-changing the contribution of Harry Colt to PV's design as Paul and Tom MacWood seemed to think a few years ago. I think this is the real deal from both close and contemporaneous reporting from someone who was right there to see it and hear it from the horse's mouth.

One would have been led to believe by Paul or Tom MacWood that just mentioning that Colt's primary contribution to PV was the 5th hole was something some at PV came up with years later to glorify Crump at Colt's expense but that description was offered in Jan 1914 when Crump was very much there and alive and with four more years to go before he died suddenly.

But again, this new news about Crump and his buddies feelings about Fowler and his architecture does not surprise me at all because for years I've suspected it was healthland architecture that Crump was really interested in and Fowler was certainly considered to be the best or one of the best of them at that point in  1914.

[BCrosby]

I've thought for a while that the real history of gca is buried in newpapers and magazines of the era. Some of that stuff is now lost, but most of it is still out there to be discovered.

I've never had the time to do the digging to determine whether my hunch was correct. What Joe is finding seems to confirm my guess.

Great work Joe. Keep on truckin'.

Bob

[Paul_Turner]

Bob:

The revelation that Crump and his Pine Valley buddies were so high on Fowler and his architecture was total news to me and is a whole lot of the value of these articles and info Joe Bausch is coming up with via The Inquirer.

This stuff was clearly not being made up by some newspaper reporter. Obviously Verdant Green (whoever that really was) had been there at Pine Valley to talk with these guys and to see Fowler's plans under glass and all that.

I sure don't want to get into some big dispute again about Colt's role in all this but it sure isn't lost on me that one of these Verdant Green Inquirer articles in Jan 1914 also mentioned that Colt's major contribution to PV was the unraveling of the 5th hole and making it the great hole it is. On the other hand, I think few appreciate how much something like that essentially made the "jigsaw" puzzle effect of much of the rest of the course just fall into place because of that 5th hole alteration of Colt's. For that reason even if one hole it's more significant than it might at first seem and it appears Crump and his buddies felt that way too from what they apparently said to Verdant Green about Colt and the 5th hole.

Again, Verdant Green was clearly speaking directly to Crump and his buddies and it appears they're the ones who said that too!

I don't think this is any dissing or short-changing the contribution of Harry Colt to PV's design as Paul and Tom MacWood seemed to think a few years ago. I think this is the real deal from both close and contemporaneous reporting from someone who was right there to see it and hear it from the horse's mouth.

One would have been led to believe by Paul or Tom MacWood that just mentioning that Colt's primary contribution to PV was the 5th hole was something some at PV came up with years later to glorify Crump at Colt's expense but that description was offered in Jan 1914 when Crump was very much there and alive and with four more years to go before he died suddenly.

But again, this new news about Crump and his buddies feelings about Fowler and his architecture does not surprise me at all because for years I've suspected it was healthland architecture that Crump was really interested in and Fowler was certainly considered to be the best or one of the best of them at that point in  1914.

Tom

"Verdant Green" appears to be underplaying Colt's work at PV.  Particularly since he includes Colt's drawing in his article and doesn't mention it.  And then there's his "minor sort" comment and the fact that he isn't consistent with other closer reports by Carr and Tillinghast.  Let alone Colt's own comments.

The Fowler info is intriguing.  We know his partner Simpson visited PVGC but not sure about Fowler.

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom Paul,

I think we can pretty much draw a straight evolutionary line about now between Fowler/Colt/Simpson and Heathland architecture and the naturalist movement (if I can call it that) in America that began around the early teens.  It was probably exhibited earliest at places like Merion and Pine Valley, and even the original Shawnee pictures look to try and blend with nature.

The wild thing that I just realized yesterday is that Cobbs Creek, built by Wilson, Crump, Smith, et.al., in 1915 has some of the most natural looking greensites around, and they are ALL still original (except for 3 which got rebuilt after flooding).   Many of them just flow out of the ground, which was much different given the earlier US models.

[TEPaul]

"Tom Paul,
I think we can pretty much draw a straight evolutionary line about now between Fowler/Colt/Simpson and Heathland architecture and the naturalist movement (if I can call it that) in America that began around the early teens."


Mike:

As I'm sure you now know I've been thinking in that direction and looking in that direction for some years now and saying so on this site for some years now.

The reasons seem more and more obvious as time goes by and more documentary evidence is uncovered in newspapers and periodicals all over the place that've been hiding in archives for many decades---ie those guys were looking to build courses and do projects INLAND and to them the first really good attempts at naturalism with man-made architecture in the world was in the heathlands and that was their examples and their prototypes back then and they knew that. The fact is, at that time, there weren't any other examples in the world of good man-made architecture INLAND that was remotely natural looking!

We just have to pay more attention to what the difference and dynamics were back then between linksland golf courses and inland golf courses and what the differences meant to them at that time, not to us now.

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom,

I think I know what you're saying.

At the time, the whole idea of "inland golf" was revolutionary!

After all, by the late 1800's, golf had been played on the seaside links for decades...centuries, actually, and the idea of moving from that naturally open, sandy, choppy, undulating, wind-swept terrain into the inner-breast of the country landscape was a daunting and skeptical proposition, and it also seems if I read my history correctly that some of the first attempts were pretty dismal failures, because for the first time in golf, a course had to be more man-made than God-made, and there was really no precedent for that, either architecturally, agronomically, or culturally in fact.

So, when the first successful inland courses in the Heathlands began to pop up in the English countryside, which not incidentally was on terrain much more similar to what folks in places like...oh, let's say Philadelphia and south Jersey had to work with back in the states, it would have been natural for those pioneers in the US who weren't blessed with seaside terrain to stand up and take notice.  

Especially considering that men like Wilson, and Crump, and Alex Findlay, and Tillinghast, and Samuel Allen, and likely others had made a number of golf-related pilgrimages overseas (following the Macdonald example), and were most definitely very aware of what guys like Colt, Hutchinson, Fowler,  Simpson, etc., had accomplished, and in some cases, seem to have struck up personal relationships with these men, that were further strengthened when the Heathland gang made visits to the US and either contributed to or advised or simply visited inland courses that were being built in the states.

I wish I could find it, and it might have been part of Tom MacWood's research, but I do recall coming across something that mentioned Colt visiting Hugh Wilson at Merion, and also visiting Seaview.

I think that's part of why we still argue about who did what here, but to me, as in the recent Cobb's Creek research, it's more important to understand why these men worked together in the way that they did, and also to imagine the shared sense of discovery and adventure that they must have collectively felt.   After all, they were both pioneers and trendsetters, breaking with centuries of tradition.

[TEPaul]

"Tom
"Verdant Green" appears to be underplaying Colt's work at PV.  Particularly since he includes Colt's drawing in his article and doesn't mention it.  And then there's his "minor sort" comment and the fact that he isn't consistent with other closer reports by Carr and Tillinghast.  Let alone Colt's own comments."

Paul:

I hate to disagree with you again as I did back a few years ago during those threads that so many on here seemed to appreciate on the creation of Pine Valley and the breakdown on the design of the finished product between Crump's and Colt's contributions.

I don't think Verdant Green (whoever that really was) was underplaying anything about Colt's role, particularly since he seems to be reporting directly from the participants---eg Crump and his buddies who were doing Pine Valley.

I don't think Colt's drawings of Pine Valley were all that important in the final analysis since much of what he drew was either already thought of and/or done by Crump before Colt got there or changed by Crump later from what Colt suggested and/or drew.

On one of these Pine Valley threads in the last few years I think I already offered the breakdown of what I firmly believe was Crump and what was Colt.

A thumbnail sketch for now would be something like this---eg Colt was responsible for the routing and design of holes #9 definitely, perhaps #8, definitely #10 and definitely #11. What he did with #5 is a well known fact and mentioned by Crump et al and Verdant Green and others---eg he moved the green site to where it is from a very different par 3 hole by Crump from the same tee.

In my opinion, on the front nine Crump is responsible for at least seven hole irrefutably. On the back nine it gets more complex but I don't think more than two holes on the back nine were solely Colt's, although Colt did ply the routing in some direction such as from #12 to #15 that Crump hadn't before Colt got there.

And more than that I think some of this new information backs up and confirms what I said above and said for some years now.

More importantly, Verdant Green's articles seem to be taken from direct interviews by Crump and his buddies and I don't see how you or anyone else can say and prove, at this point, that Crump was ever trying to diss or downplay Colt. Maybe some at PV tried to do that in the 70s and 80s and such but certainly not back then when these articles were written. Frankly, why would they do that back then when Crump was still alive?

I think this also underscores what I said years ago and that was that when the course opened for play around 1914 with a partial course Crump and Carr and his buddies, including Travis, really played up Colt's role and why wouldn't they? At that time Crump certainly understood that the famous English architect Harry Colt was more recognizable and more saleable than he was at that time.

But the thing that most fail to appreciate is there was still four more years to go of Crump working on that course and its routing and design every day (between 1914 and 1918 when he died suddenly and unexpectedly). Some seem to assume that what a guy like Carr or even Travis wrote about PV and its design and construction in 1914 was the final word about the design and construction of the course. It wasn't as Crump had four more years to go and he worked on the course practically every day doing with it whatever he wanted to do with no limitation on his decisions.

The thing I think you finally have to come to grips with Paul, is Crump was certainly not trying to downplay Colt or anyone else and the time is probably long overdue you stop saying that or implying that. The record shows he just didn't do things like that with anyone.

But the thing I think you need to appreciate more is Crump did a lot more regarding the way the course finally turned out before Colt got there and he did a lot more that deviated from what Colt drew after Colt left and never returned.

And why wouldn't Crump do it that way? After-all Pine Valley was basically his golf course and he could do with it what he wanted to. There was basically noone else he had to answer to and it's always been pretty clear that EVERYONE understood that including everyone at Pine Valley.

When I think back on some of those exchanges on Pine Valley with Tom MacWood and how he said Pine Valley was dissing Colt in some attempt to glorify Crump I have to laugh now. It only underscores what I said all along about him ---that he's an impressive uncoverer of raw research material but he doesn't have much facility or ability, in my opinion, in interpreting it regarding what really happened back then and why and how.

[TEPaul]

"Tom,
I think I know what you're saying.
At the time, the whole idea of "inland golf" was revolutionary!


Mike:

What I'm saying is "inland golf" may not have been revolutionary but more like a progression of what first happened when golf and golf courses and architecture first began to emigrate out of Scotland for the first time.

The fact is it went to places and sites that, as Behr said, were wholly unsuited to receive it and that fact was probably responsible for the decades long era known as the "Dark Ages" or "Steeplechase" architecture of the 1870s, 80s and 90s in England and elsewhere.

And I'm not talking just about pre-existing natural features that are so benefical to golf that the linksland has always been imbued with and many of the first inland sites outside Scotland had so little of, I'm also talking about an agronomic makeup that the heathlands had that was the first found inland that was remarkably similar to the Scottish linksland after a few decades of early INLAND golf outside Scotland that had none of that.

The latter may've had a lot more to do with the architectural phenomenon that became the HEATHLAND prototype than anything else, much more so even than the first far more natural looking architecture that happened there INLAND!

It is probably not just a coincidence that after looking for some years in New Jersey for a site and then after traveling to GB Crump not only became enamored by heathland golf architecture but he also began searching for sites in sandy type soil as was the heathlands as well as the Scottish linksland.

[TEPaul]

Mike:

Sorry but when I wrote the last post I hadn't read farther than your first paragraph.

Yes, of course, men like Wilson probably turned at first to the inland man-made heathland model but guys like Wilson did not at that time understand or appreciate the importance of the soil makeup. Crump may've gotten lucky with his site choice in going into sand but Wilson didn't at first appreciate the agronomic significance of that and he went to a clay based farm soil site and because of the resulting agronomic problems therewith basically came to create the USGA Green Section.

Crump, on the other hand, didn't seem to appreciate or understand the agronomic importance of going to a site that had too much of a sand makeup as Macdonald hadn't really appreciated the same fact just before him.

[Eric Pevoto]

"By 1904 it was evident that golf have come to stay in America, but the subclay soils among Philadelphia suburbs made it impossible to play with any degree of comfort more that seven months each year, despite expensive drainage systems, put in at the larger clubs like Merion."

"The grass planted even as late as October is coming along surprisingly, thanks to the top dressing of rich, black muck, taken from the swamp bottoms."  

Both quotes above are from the 1914 article.  

Was it simply luck that the PV site had both sandy high ground and swamp bottoms?  Wow.  

[Paul_Turner]

Tom

No Verdant Green was playing down Colt's involvement. Particularly in 1914!  No mention of the plan or booklet.

The whole argument using the Colt name as a promotional is ridiculous.  Why would they suddenly decide to do this in 1915/1916?

And if Colt's contribution was so minor then whey did they call on Colt and Alison to finish the course design in 1921 when there were so many other qualified local architects at the same time.

You commenti on how Crump was drawing from the heathland architects but then fail to give them much credit for how PVGC turned out.

[TEPaul]

Paul:

I don't believe Crump or those from Pine Valley who were involved in the creation of the course were playing down anyone and I think these additional articles are just proving that.

It appears to me they were just explaining what was going on and how they were going about it, and this new information on how interested they apparently were in the style and drawings of Fowler (who may never have come to Pine Valley) is just another example of how they were collaborating with all kinds of ideas as Crump worked on the course almost every day for five years doing what he wanted to do with it even if he was willing to talk to all kinds of people about it.

It seems to me Crump and his buddies in his bungalow were explaining to Verdant Green directly what they felt the influence of various people on them and the course was in early 1914 and they are the ones who mentioned what they felt Colt primarily contributed.  

If they didn't know then who would?  

I don't think any of those involved in the creation were playing down Colt and either was Verdant Green and so I can't understand why you keep saying or implying that as Tom MacWood did.

Eric:

Actually the laying of all that black muck from the lake bottoms and such on the holes created something of an agronomic disaster.

[TEPaul]

Paul:

I certainly do think Crump and Pine Valley played up Colt and they did that around the time the course first opened for play at the end of 1914 and the beginning of 1915 when a flurry of articles appeared by Carr and Travis and others et al marking that occassion and basically saying the same things about Colt's involvement.

And why wouldn't a guy like Crump at that time do that? He obviously understood that Colt was a far more notable and recognizable golf course architect than he was at that time (1914).

It also appears Crump told some people that Colt was paid $10,000 dollars for basically a week's work at Pine Valley when no record of that has been found anywhere and certainly not in the fairly meticulous club records not to mention that was a pretty ridiculously high sum for that day and time.

Otherwise it's pretty hard to explain why the likes of Tillinghast wrote what he did about Crump's role and it's also really hard to explain what Carr and W.P Smith said about Crump's role some years later.

I think Crump and the club did patently promote Colt's name at the opening of the course in late 1914 and I think Colt willingly went along with it.

And again, why not do that at that time?

[wsmorrison]

Paul,

Whatever you think of Colt (I agree with you when I say that he was the best of all) it seems pretty clear that Crump was well into the design phase when Colt appeared onto the scene.  For the short time that Colt spent at the scene and maybe some of the work he did after he left, he made some significant contributions and likely a good amount of sound advice.  Wasn't it Colt that planted hundreds of trees at Sunningdale for the express purpose of hole segregation?  That clearly was a huge influence on Crump and the way Pine Valley is presented.  However, he left and Crump worked daily for the next 4 years.  Over that time, he continued to be fascinated by Fowler (he surely saw Walton Heath on his study period abroad) as were his friends.  Fowler's influence should also be considered and looked for on the course.  A lot of talented and passionate people were involved.  Colt had a significant role as was always noted by the club.  Crump has to be considered the single most important figure in the design and development.  Of that, there should be no doubt.

[TEPaul]

"Tom
No Verdant Green was playing down Colt's involvement. Particularly in 1914!  No mention of the plan or booklet."

Paul:

For someone to assume Verdant Green or Crump or the club was playing down Colt's involvement by not mentioning Colt's whole course plan or his hole-by-hole booklet one would have to assume Colt developed that entire plan and that it was being specifically followed.

Neither was the case and that's completely provable by all kinds of documentary evidence through the years of the creation of the course that seems to be getting larger as time goes on.

[Willie_Dow]

TP did you note that PT's 1915 reprints include mention that January 1915 David Cuthbert, pro from HV had a hole in one on the 5th at PV.  A blind pitch to a tricky green.  Colt had declared that the hole was a thoroughly bad one.