[JESII]

Charlie wasn't crumudgeonly in 1912...he was to busy chasing tail to be crumudgeonly...since I have too many kids to chase tail, I would not be surprised that I am more crumudgeonly than old Charlie ever was...


Oh, by the way, I don't use smilies because Dan Kelly told me I shouldn't so the burden is on the reader to understand the humor...like someone singing "Mary had a little lamb..."

[RJ_Daley]

Tom, if you have anything that defines context of the source of CBs pissedoffedness, as the way Merion was 'evolving', would that point to supporting evidence that he was pissed at the 'departure' from gca plans he had originally provided to Merion, that weren't being adhered to, in his classic mentality of 'template holes' and that Merion was going its own way.  But, he didn't go too far publicly, due to betting into a pissing match with the high and mighty of Merion club?  

Anotherwords, if CB's words of being pissed are pointed at Merion, he'd need a reason to be pissed, such as departure from his ideas.

.. must have proof of specific words to go that far in conjecture...  

[RJ_Daley]

Sully, I for one am glad for emoticons, and the instantaneous feedback from the internet.  I'd hate to get into a back and forth of intended humor with TEP or even Dan Kelly, via U.S. Mail delivered via trains, back in the day, as HIW had to wait for his messages back and forth with Piper and Oakley or CB, or whomever he was consulting with. 

Can you imagine this thread being conducted via U.S. Mail?  We'd have to learn to write like Monks with drawings of emoticons or cartoons in the margin to express our humor or dismay with smiling nuns or frowning friars to indicate our intentions.  Wait a week and a half for a smiley reply... or sarcastic rejoinder... thats the ticket 

PS: I feel I have to tell Dan Kelly when I'm being sarcastic, like all the time...

[Joe Hancock]

RJ,

Didn't the Pony Express originate somewhere in your neck of the woods? Do you still remember those days?.....

 

[RJ_Daley]

Joe, I left you a postcard from Wild Horse at the pony express station that is located in downtown Gothenburg.  Did you get it?  They said Buffalo Bill hisownself was going to ride the link between G-burg and Omaha. It contained my best wishes for a happy 1876. 

[DMoriarty]

In other words, it mentions "American links designer Hugh G. Wilson" as being over there going over ideas for holes.

This is not what the blurb says.  The heading is "An American Links Designer."   The blurb mentions Hugh Wilson's travels in the first sentence, but goes on to discuss C.B.M., his past travels, the sketches and maps he created on his trips, and his course, NGLA.

It is possible that the heading refers to Hugh Wilson.   But it is also possible and I think more likely that the heading refers to CBM.   But either way it doesnt matter one bit.   Because  Wilson was over there to get ideas for the course and in that sense was working on the design.     

David,

Oh..."gotcha".   I see.

I'm guessing Tom just found that last evening while cleaning out the attic?

Does the article say that this was Wilson's first visit, or is that being saved for later effect, because I didn't read that anywhere? 
. . .
I would ask if there are any other critical or relevant pieces of evidence that you and Tom have that we should know about before asking us to participate in a good faith critical analyisis of your piece?

Or am I missing the point?

You asked me and others to not listen to what we had heard about your motives.  I sent you a private email stating that I was hoping to put that behind us and would disregard that rumor talk as overblown and would proceed trusting that you were on the up and up.

Fool me once...

TEPaul wrote:

However, if we find out that those plans and that blurb has been available to those contributing to this piece, "The Missing Faces of Merion" for some time, and all of this is just being "staged in" in this manner basically for the purpose of embarrassing Merion or some of us here, well then, I will still be very glad for this new truly interesting and important information on the course's architectural history but I will definitely have a whole lot less respect for the people who are doing it that way than I do right now for some of the various methods and innuendos and remarks they have already made about us here, some of our courses and architects and basically our town. And if Ran Morrissett happens to have been aware of this kind of method designed to embarrass us for some time then that includes him too and his GOLFCLUBATLAS.com.

I thought we had moved past this bizarre and unfounded paranoia, yet here you both are again suggesting that my only purpose in life is to embarrass Merion and make you two look foolish. 

It is not only offensive, it is also pathetically narcissistic.  But most of all it is just tired.   

MacWood found the blurb yesterday, sent it to me, and I posted it.

I have nothing but respect for Merion, and am trying to treat the subject accordingly.

As for you guys, maybe instead of worrying about me you to should just stop making fools of yourselves.

[Phil_the_Author]

David wrote, "MacWood found the blurb yesterday, sent it to me, and I posted it."

I can verify that as Tom Macwood shared that same thought with me that he had just come across it yesterday.

[Adam_Messix]

Can I ask a question to the group.....

It seems to me that are some that want to give C. B. MacDonald co-attribution for Merion East's original design.  My question would be, if that's the case, then we should give MacKenzie credit for Riviera?  There is physical evidence (multiple photos) of MacKenzie onsite with Thomas and Bell with sketch pad in hand.  I've never heard of MacKenzie being credited before and AT THIS POINT in the discussion, there's more physical evidence of him at Riviera than MacDonald/Whigham/Barker at Merion....

[DMoriarty]

Credit or co-attribution is not my concern. 

Also I am not sure you have read the essay, because your analogy really is not at all applicable.  To make it applicable we'd have to:

-First take Thomas and Bell out of the picture completely.
-Then we'd have to have Riviera invite MacKenzie down to the site to inspect the raw land,
-then MacKenzie would have to write out his ideas on what could be done with the property, and send them to Riviera
-Then Riviera would have to purchase the property based largely on MacKenzie's written recommendations.
-then a Riviera club member with no design experience would have to  travel to Cypress  (or another great MacKenzie course) to study with MacKenzie for three days to learn how to build Riviera,
-then MacKenzie would have to return to Pacific Palisades before primary construction to further help the member with the plans for the course.
-then the member would have to build a course with holes that were widely recognized as based on the same specific fundamental principles as holes at MacKenzie's courses.

If those were the facts I have a feeling that we wouldn't need to even be having this conversation.   Didn't MacKenzie rightfully receive design credit for much less?

[TEPaul]

"MacWood found the blurb yesterday, sent it to me, and I posted it.
I have nothing but respect for Merion, and am trying to treat the subject accordingly.
As for you guys, maybe instead of worrying about me you to should just stop making fools of yourselves."


David:

I'm very glad to hear you say Tom MacWood found that British magazine blurb on Wilson and the purpose of the 1912 trip abroad yesterday and sent it to you yesterday and that this kind of info on here isn't just being sort of staged in as this thread goes on to try to make some of us here look foolish. I take you at your word on that. Again, glad to hear it and I applaud you also as I hear you've been sort of communicating on material you have with Wayne Morrison offline anyway. As you know I offered to do that myself with you about a week ago offline but you said you'd prefer not to do that at this time. I notice Phil Young confirms that Tom MacWood apparently found that blurb yesterday and sent him a copy of it yesterday.

However, it's pretty indicative that Tom MacWood certainly didn't seem to want to inform us of it or email it to any of us here. Additionally, we've been hearing certainly from him constantly over the years how we're always trying to suppress or dismiss or downplay information and architectural attribution on other architects or whatever to unfairly promote and glorify our own architects and our own clubs at the expense of other architects such as Colt or Macdonald and now apparently H.H. Barker.

This was completely the case with his position on Colt and Crump and Pine Valley. The back pages of this website are chocked full of those insinuations. The same has been true for Merion and the back pages of this website are full of those insinuations from him too. I certainly doubt anyone reading any of those threads could miss that. His term for it is the "Philadelphia Syndrome" and that too is on a few of these Merion threads and he suggests it's some kind of a conspiracy that has been going on around here from the beginnings of these clubs and continuing with us today. A number of recent emails from him to us here and to me are full of the same thing. I'd be glad to make them available to you too if you don't believe me but there's no need to put them on here as that would definitely be counterproductive to this thread and subject.

Again, I'm glad to hear that this isn't being carefully staged to try to make us look foolish and that's what you just said on here publicly and I take you at your word on that even though in the last line of your last post you told us, once again, we are making fools of ourselves. That's pretty interesting, don't you thing, David?    

Lastly, I really am interested to see how this all plays out in the end and I certainly am very curious about what that British blurb means about plans from Macdonald that the magazine mentioned it would be running later. I hope someone finds them in old articles from that British magazine. What they are and who they're done by might be really interesting to the original architectural phase of Merion whether their Wilson's or Macdonald's or Whigam's or someone else's.

And I'm very glad to see you say you have real respect for Merion. As you know, obviously we here do too.

[TEPaul]

David:

I noticed what you just said to Adam Messix by analogy to Mackenzie and Riviera.

Can you please show us what Macdonald actually said or wrote to Merion about his opinions of the raw land Ardmore site?

Can you show us what Merion Cricket Club actually said about his opinions of the raw land Ardmore site and that their decision to buy it was BASED LARGELY on Macdonald's opinions of it?

[Peter Pallotta]

A couple of pages of terrific posts, thanks gents. If I had to single out only one, I think for me Bob Crosby's post #108 is it.  It gets to the heart of the questions I find myself thinking about most.

I'm just not so sure it's the design credit that's ambiguous. What may be ambiguous (and what might be causing the 'design credit ambiguity') is our lack of understanding of exactly what the act of golf course design involved back then, and of what the various and different approaches that might've qualified as golf course design were back then. 

When we talk about designing a course, what are we talking about? Is it Barker 'laying out' Merion (and the many other places he seems to have visited briefly)? Is it what Macdonald "conceived of" at NGLA, and then brought with him on his visits to Merion? Is it Hugh Wilson "building" Merion, with the final work being done after he visited the UK?

I don't have answers to these questions. Maybe others do. But if no ones does have those answers, I'd suggest that it's maybe not so much the design credit of Merion that's ambiguous, but something deeper and more fundamental, i.e. the evolving nature and essence and definitions of golf course design in America over the last nearly 100 years. 

Peter

Edit - I shouldn't have said "briefly" about Mr. Barker's visits, especially if that comes off as derogatory. I've just read some of the old articles from 1909, 1910, and 1911, and he seems to have been at a lot of places designing courses - that's not in itself a bad thing, but I had in my mind people like Mr. Crump and Mr. Wilson, who spent so much time at one course, and so made the comparison, which is probably unfair. 

[DMoriarty]

Tom Paul,

Again you foolishly cast aspersions at Tom MacWood, and again you have no idea what you are talking about.   Given your record of concealing and faking information, you've got a lot of nerve.   While MacWood's email is none of your business, it included the following line:

"By all means post it - the more info brought to the table the better." 

[Adam_Messix]

David--

Actually, I've read your essay twice and plan on going through it again because there is a lot of material covered.  

Also, I'm not referring to anything you said in your essay, but in reference to what others have said on this thread.  It's like I said in an earlier post, your essay brings forth some questions that I hope are answered.  

My use of MacKenzie at Riviera may not have been the best analogy, but my concern is about jumping the gun before you've presented all the evidence.  I have an open mind for facts and evidence but there are a number of skeptics out there (both those who post on this site (and not necessarily posted on this thread) and those who are reading this who aren't posters) who will have a difficult time believing that there's anyone other than Wilson and his Committee who designed Merion.  

I look forward to reading Part 2 and seeing what other evidence You uncover.  

[Mike_Cirba]

David,

People have been looking for documentation of this for, oh...the past fifty years or so and miraculously Tom MacWood finds this article yesterday?!?!?!  

Ok...whatever.  

Tom Paul,

I find it interesting and quite telling that the Merion History Book names the
members of the "Merion Cricket Club Golf Association" that was formed in 1909 to investigate how to handle the problems that new Haskell ball presented for the club and it's limited original property.  Wasn't this the name of the group who bought the property for the club?

It seems that both Hugh Wilson and Alan Wilson were both deeply and fundamentally involved in these matters for the club as early as 1909, so it's not as if he just suddenly was popped into service in January 1911 as was suggested.

I also find it passing strange that so many of the Merion membership had extensive overseas travel prior, and were certainly familiar with the great holes overseas.   For instance, according to the manifests,  Robert W. Lesley had four separate visits to Europe between 1905 and 1910.   Others like Griscom went there regularly, as well, and if anyone's interested, I can do a whole breakdown of the entire committee's travels during this period.

So, although the intent seems to be that only Charley Macdonald was familiar with the great courses overseas, that was hardly the case at all.   Philadelphian Tillinghast likely had the most experience and extensive travelogue, and he was friends with all of these guys.    Alex Findlay was in Philly at this time too, Crump had just come back from a three month visit, so did Father Carr, and so on, so it's not like the idea of an Alps or Redan or Punchbowl were foreign concepts, with or without the input of Macdonald and Whigham or Barker.

In fact, in rereading the atttributions given to Macdonald, what seems to really stand out to me is that the Merion Committee seemed more interested in his knowledge of soils and grasses and construction techniques than they were about whether to bunker the inside or outside of a dogleg hole.  

It also seems passing strange that there were 300 acres available, and yet the "experts" on the scene recommended an L-shaped, 117 acres bisected by a public road, so narrow that not even a mid-length par four could be squeezed in sideways on eithe side, and oh...by the way...we have a bit rock pit up on the northeast quadrant!      

In fact, most of the rest of the property that was given over to housing was at least as good.

The funny thing is that from a routing standpoint, it couldn't have been all that impressive, because within the first 15 years, 7 of the holes had been fully or partially re-routed.    

From a routing standpoint, it's also interesting to consider what Macdonald had done by that time.   NGLA was still under construction, but even that great course was a simplistic "out-and-back" routing, something that he'd seen at places like The Old Course and North Berwick, but not in and of itself being something of great sophistication and requiring advanced intellect and experience.   And, we've also all heard of his original Chicago Golf Club, which could hardly be called anything but primitive.

In any case, I have more to write, but perhaps I'll do it sometime in the future when I'm comfortable that we're not just being setup to be trumped with the latest "midnight find" in someone's attic.  

  

[TEPaul]

David:

It's a fairly general and far-ranging subject, to say the least, and I certainly don't want it to divert the immediate subject this thread is on now, but I do want to mention something you not only keep implying but quite clearly stated rather liberally as not just your opinion but basically as a fact throughout your piece, "The Missing Faces of Merion."

And that is that Hugh Wilson was far too much the novice in architecture to have possibly been able to do what the club and some of its reports on him say he did. That is a subject I've been meaning to get to on this thread and in the critique of your piece.

That you say that is your opinion and that you attempt to pass it off as a fact just might be one of the most egregious and unfortunate things that could possibly be said by someone who even remotely claims to be a golf architecture researcher and an analyst. Tom MacWood has virtually insinuated the very same thing on here about a few architects that include Wilson and Crump. Maybe you two have been talking together too much and this common thought between you is the result of it.

I'm not sure why some people tend to do that. It's what one history professor labels as an attitude of some present day thinking he calls "No-Can-Dosim." He suggests that since some today really don't understand the times and people of their subjects well enough they tend to just ASSUME they weren't capable of doing something really fine because they were too uninformed or backward or untalented or whatever.

To just try to explain away that Wilson and his committee may not have been able to route and design Merion East largely themselves both insults people like Wilson and those who worked with him there on that committee and it also fairly dismisses, denies and also insults one of the truly interesting times and occurences in all golf architectural history.

And just the literary technique you use to do this is also really unfortunate in my opinion. In your piece you essentially suggest that Wilson was just doing nothing in 1910 with the course or the land and just sitting there waiting to be appointed to do something in January 1911. You do this when you imply it must have been that way simply because YOU can find no evidence of it! One way to do it is perhaps to just use a little bit more good old fashioned common-sense and logic.

But yet you suggest that both Francis and Lloyd who would be working on the committee in a few weeks with Wilson as its chairman were out there tweaking Macdonald's routing themselves before the committee was even formed (which is also your contention). What logical reason could any reasonable mind think of that they would be doing that if the man who would be their committee chairman was just sitting around doing nothing simply because his committee had not yet been appointed??

You ask us to fairly critique your piece? Well, this post right here is fairly critiquing your piece and if you don't think so I would love to hear you explain why. You often say you want facts but yet it is not a fact that Francis and Lloyd were tweaking Macdonald's routing in 1910, it is nothing more than your opinion that they were doing that at that time. You call our opinions speculation and of course yours is as well. It seems the only reason you did that with Francis and Lloyd is because it's the only explanation you could come up with that continues to support your assumption and conclusion that Macdonald routed and designed Merion.

[TEPaul]

"Again you foolishly cast aspersions at Tom MacWood, and again you have no idea what you are talking about.   Given your record of concealing and faking information, you've got a lot of nerve.   While MacWood's email is none of your business....."



David:

Let me suggest something to you. My relationship with Tom MacWood is MY business and his relationship with me is HIS business and it's between us and that is probably REALLY something that is none of YOUR business. But if you want to continue to make it YOUR BUSINESS on here on this discussion group I don't think it will do these threads much good.

In the past he has said derogatory things to me on here about my opinions and I've said derogatory things on here about his opinions. That's all part of the record on this website on architectural issues. I simply do not agree with many of the things he has said, and assumed and concluded on here and he apparently feels the same about some of the things I've said and assumed and concluded on here on issues and subjects to do with golf course architecture.

This is a free world, the Internet is free, we're free people able to say the things we want to and you are definitely not going to stop me doing that about any opinions I have including how I feel about some of Tom MacWood's opinions on some of these subjects or of Philadelphia architects or courses or even of me. I don't care where he says these derogatory things about me or those other subjects----whether it's through getting you to post his feelings or getting Ran Morrissett to do it or even if it's in emails to me. If I feel like mentioning any of the things he says through any of those means I will do just that. If he wants to respond himself he should simply reregister like everyone else on here. Even that he refuses to do that continues to influence my opinion of him---eg that he tries to do it through others, in my opinion, is just another example of his penchant for avoiding some of the personal responsibilities the rest of us take when we post to one another on this website.

If you want to continue to play the part of his defender against me on this website as you just did again in a pretty insulting way on that last post then I'm sure I can't stop you and really won't try but that's exaclty the kind of thing that has led to some real incivility on this website between us.

I don't want to go there again on this thread or on this site.

Do you?

[TEPaul]

"Tom Paul,
I find it interesting and quite telling that the Merion History Book names the
members of the "Merion Cricket Club Golf Association" that was formed in 1909 to investigate how to handle the problems that new Haskell ball presented for the club and it's limited original property.  Wasn't this the name of the group who bought the property for the club?"

MikeC:

Yes it was the group that bought the land in Ardmore. It was also the way Richard Francis signed a letter to Russell Oakley when acting on behalf of Hugh Wilson when he was abroad in 1912.

It remained the name of the club until the "Merion Golf Club" as we know it today was formed in 1941. Actually there's some pretty neat history to that event of when they became Merion GC. The vote was taken one day in December 1941 and when the participants emerged from the meeting they heard that Japan had attacked the United States at Pearl Harbor. That was of course December 7, 1941---"a date that will live in infamy." 

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom,

Unless some new clandestine, midnight evidence suddenly shows up again, I'm not seeing what's new here?

We now know that HH Barker produced a plan for the property, but we haven't the slightest idea whether any of it was used.

We've always known that Macdonald and Whigham were part of the site purchase review process, and that they blessed it, but has a shred of evidence been produced that they either 1) suggested any routing they might have come up with themselves, or 2) revised Barker's original proposed routing?  or 3) that the Merion Committee acted to construct either hypothetical routing?

David's paper states that Wilson and the Committee met with Macdonald at the under-construction NGLA in January 1911, and in Hugh Wilson's own words, states that Macdonald gave them a good start in understanding "the principles" that they (the committee) would need to apply to their "own natural conditions".

Do we have any evidence at all that Wilson and crew used Barker's layout?   Or that Macdonald suggested a layout?   Perhaps I didn't read carefully enough?

In fact, it seems Wilson and company were so excited by what they had seen at NGLA and the sketches and maps of the great holes abroad and their strategic principles at Macdonald's bungalow that they were overcome with evangelical spirit.   For those numerous members of the Merion Committee who had travelled overseas prior to 1911 and played the great courses of Great Britain, I'm sure it was a reminder of what was possible on linksland, and the inland courses that were being built in the Heathlands possibly had applicability to Merion's conditions.

Plus, Charley was in the process of learning how to actually construct holes and grow grass!   THAT to me seems to be the biggest DISCOVERY that these men of the Merion Committee were interested in!!!

If they wanted to hear about the Alps or the Redan, they had Tilly, and Findlay, and Crump, and Carr, and Lesley, and Griscom, floating around town.   If they wanted to learn about soil mixtures, or grass seed...well...Charley was trying to do it right, don't you think?

Even if we assume that Wilson's first trip to see the great courses in Great Britain was in 1912, as David contends, he was hanging out every day with a bunch of people who had been there and played those great courses and seen the wonderful holes!   Many times!!

In fact, as I read this again, it seem pretty clear to me that when the Merion Committte came back after the two-day visit with Macdonald at NGLA, it was with a very clear idea of what they wanted to accomplish.  First, it seems the developed a very raw framework and grassed the property, and let's face it, the limitations of the narrow, limited property that was purchased for golf, whether recommended by Barker, or Macdonald/Whigham, or both really dicated the possibilities of the routing(let's not forget that the lower part of the property whose purchase a decade later would permit the introduction of today's 1, 10, 11, 12, and 13 to the course).

In fact, David's paper talks about the wonderful compliments on the routing that have taken place over the years, but these reviews were all done after the extensive changes done by Wilson and FLynn in the earliest years.   In fact, even those reviews are mostly complimentary of the fact that the holes manage to be magnificent in spite of the squeezed acreage and general awkwardness of the property, not because of it.

After Wilson's return at the beginning of May 1912, even when the course was opened five months later, according to Tillinghast and "Far and Sure" it was still "in progress", and in a very raw form, and the holes were just beginning to exhibit the greatness of "problems conceived by Hugh I. Wilson and the Construction Committee".

It was Sept 14, 1912, and now several years since Barker had been there, and 18 months after the last visit by Macdonald and yet the course was still in a primitive, early, conceptual state when it opened.

I think that in and of itself proves that the architectural attributions that have been assigned to each of the men involved over the decades since are accurate, and sufficient.

[DMoriarty]

David,

People have been looking for documentation of this for, oh...the past fifty years or so and miraculously Tom MacWood finds this article yesterday?!?!?!   

Ok...whatever. 

You've got us Mike.  Tom MacWood and I have been sitting on that blurb, hiding if from the world's researchers for the last 50 YEARS!  I convinced him that yesterday was the day to finally use it, and against you, because you are just that formidable.   
_______________________________

TEPaul,

I am sure that the facts and analysis in my essay address any actual substantive points you might have stumbled across in the above posts.

[Mike_Cirba]

You've got us Mike.  Tom MacWood and I have been sitting on that blurb, hiding if from the world's researchers for the last 50 YEARS!  I convinced him that yesterday was the day to finally use it, and against you, because you are just that formidable.   

Thank you, David.   Apparently, you're correct in at least one of your assumptions. 

The rest...the jury is still out.   

[TEPaul]

MikeC:

Interesting what you say about Merion's routing and that land and its natural features, compared to some of the other land The Haverford Development possessed. Over the years I've known a ton of people who live all throughout that land and it really isn't anywhere near as interesting as the land the Merion East Course is on---or the West Course, for that matter.

The fact that it is such a long narrow site is interesting too and frankly, I'd think probably would appeal to Macdonald because of what he was familiar with at that time---eg NGLA is not really any wider than a two hole corridor site, and of course that is the same configuration of many of the old linksland out and back courses.

But the thing that continues to both amaze and amuse me is how David Moriarty just seems to assume as a fact that Wilson and his committee of four other amateur club members were basically incapable at that time of routing and designing that golf course because he calls them novices.

I really do wonder why he thinks that way. The only logical reason I can come up with is it's simply because he has absolutely no experience at all with trying to do something like that. As you know, I have and twice within five miles of Merion.

Wilson was a good player, he was the captain of the Princeton team and obviously he'd seen plenty of golf courses being a guy like that and a good player. As far as I know Harvard has always competed at Myopia and it seems pretty logical to assume Wilson must have known that one pretty well when he played against Harvard. To imagine he wouldn't have known GCGC is pretty unthinkable too.

The fact is, although routing a golf course can get pretty complex and certainly maddening sometimes when one runs into sequential obstacles---eg the famous Francis "quarry" hole story, routing on some sites just isn't that hard and it certainly isn't rocket science for someone whose a golfer and who's observant and Wilson certainly was both.

Doing routing can actually take you on what Bill Coore sometimes refers to as a "golf walk", in other words, the land sometimes can just sort of show you the way and lead you around. Once you get started in a particular direction at Merion East's site it really is very much that way---ie there just isn't much latitude to go sideways on that site other than where it does, and in that sense it really is a pretty simple "golf walk" as Coore says. Most of the routing decisions on that site really aren't one of direction, it's more on of where to stop and start (greens and tees, and the type of par sequencing one would want on that site).

But I don't know why Moriarty, and sometimes MacWood, seem to think those first time amateur architects like Crump and Wilson weren't capable of doing certain things with architecture on there own or with their friends and collaborators without having to bring in some expert professional or whatever. God knows, that was the reason MacWood essentially gave for thinking Colt must have done more at Pine Valley---eg he just didn't seem to believe that Crump was capable of doing all that he did.

Again, I just think it must be their own lack of experience with even observing such a thing first hand while it's actually going on and taking place. But if neither of them have actually spent more than a day or perhaps never doing that or watching it being done, I guess I can understand why they think the way they do---eg a guy like Wilson would be incapable of doing it.

And that is pretty ironic with Moriarty since he plays golf at Rustic Canyon and certainly Geoff Shackelford was every bit as much of a novice and first timer at routing and hole design when he did what he did there as Wilson was at Merion East.

Moriarty may not even be aware of that either (the people involved actually don't like to talk about how that course and routing evolved ) but I am aware of it because I was there back then and I walked that routing and discussed it and all the hole concepts with Shackelford who had his own homemade flip page book on the whole thing.

So if Moriarty wants to know what a first time amateur (what he calls a novice) is capable of doing in architecture he probably ought to just call up and ask one who did it who lives right in his own hometown!   

[TEPaul]

"TEPaul,
I am sure that the facts and analysis in my essay address any actual substantive points you might have stumbled across in the above posts."

DMoriarty:

I have no idea what you mean by that. Does anyone have any idea what DMoriarty means by that? What am I missing? 

[DMoriarty]

It means that I have quit reading most of your posts, because they are a waste of time.  You put words in my mouth, take things out of context, and just sort of babble on and on without saying much of anything , wandering where you feel like. 

You have written more words in this thread than I did in my entire essay, yet you have yet to  actually address anything in my essay. 

You are still the Warren G. Harding of this website.   Your posts are an army of pompous phrases moving across the landscape in search of an idea.

[Patrick_Mucci]

Here's what I don't understand.

David produced his white paper.

Why the assault on it/him ?

Where is the academic process ?

Why is there such a clamor to disclaim it rather than analize it ?

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