Joe and I talked about Hermitage a few days back.
The more research we do, the more we find that the early Philly golfers/designers were certainly and incestual bunch, in that there only seemed to be at most two degrees of separation between any of them.
Edward Clarey is a prime example.
For years I've had in my files a copy of a news clipping from 1940 at the opening of the Philadelphia Municipal golf course called League Island (today known as Franklin Roosevelt GC) that shows Edward Clarey and Alan Corson teeing off with dignitaries.
In the article, Clarey is called "the man who constructed the course", working with Corson as the Parks Engineer. I had no real idea who either man was.
Subsequent research has shown that Clarey was for many years one of the top amateurs in Philadelphia, and played many a big match (including many at Cobb's Creek) with guys like Woody Platt and other preeminent players of the time.
He also must have gotten affiliated with the Fairmount Park guys, because when Juniata GC was built (opened in 1927) as the second Philly public course, Clarey was named the pro. It's therefore very interesting to learn that Clarey was designing courses in 1925 (Hermitage), and it wouldn't surprise me if he had input to Juniata, and Karakung, as well as Franklin Roosevelt.
Corson, we have learned, was at Cobb's Creek at its inception in 1916, working at the time as Assistant Park Engineer, under Jesse T. Vogdes and took over as Chief Park Engineer and Superintendent of Fairmount Park at least til the 40s.
In fact, sometime tomorrow morning I am going to be reviewing an early routing map of Cobb's Creek signed by Corson, date unknown.