Why Hugh Wilson and his committee routed and designed Merion East.......

[TEPaul]

" It would be great of the MacDonald/Whigham letter could be found. Is there any chance at all that it exists? Merion does not have it, without doubt?"

Kirk:

They may have it but we've never seen it and it's not like we haven't tried to find everything relating to Merion Ardmore's architectural history. One of the problems is the way the club was arranged. Back then it was the Merion Cricket Club Golf Association that was within but not wholly the same thing as Merion Cricket Club which is another facility---eg essentially a tennis and squash and eating club. It wasn't until Dec. 7, 1941 that Merion Ardmore split off from MCC and became the separate golf club it is today. So part of the problem is being this far back we can never figure out what may be at Merion G.C. and what may still be over at the Merion Cricket Club that's about three miles away and a separate club.

[TEPaul]

"Tom, I haven't read every word of this, nor have I spent a whole hell of a lot of time on it, but doesn't this boil down to the fact that a lot of those "stories in Merion's history books" were based on Wilson going to Scotland and studying the great courses prior to designing Merion."


Shivas:

Yes they were but we don't think that really matters and we can show you precisely why. I suppose David Moriarty thinks it really matters because his conclusion essentially requires one to accept the fact that if Wilson hadn't been abroad in 1910 he was too much the novice to be capable of routing and designing and building a course with a committee. We do not agree with that no matter when he was there and I think we can show you why with the relevant source material that does exist of which the accuracy of ALL of Francis's land-swap story is certainly one.

[Peter Pallotta]

This has been a really good thread, thanks gents.

If I've challenged David's essay, it's partly because I come to it with a basic assumption that I think is sensible or at least reasonable enough, i.e. that if Macdonald had done anything as significant as routing the course, we would've heard about it and heard about it a long time ago. Yet of all the related documents from the time not one of them credits Macdonald with something that significant; and a goodly number of them give the credit for Merion's creation to Wilson; and Macdonald moved on to Piping Rock and Yale and Lido and writing about NGLA and never mentioned Merion again.   

I hope I'm not being unfair to David's hard work by bringing that basic assumption to the table. And maybe I'm seeing too much forest and missing trees, but I'd like to think that, if so, it might be a healthy corrective to people missing the forest for the trees.

David writes:  "The Committee did not want to print it, so they gave a cursory treatment.   The Committee is generalizing not M&W." Okay, but the question is, what were M&W being specific ABOUT?  The Committee says Macdonald's report was "favorable."  Has anyone ever heard of specific routing recommendations/plans/designs that could be distilled down to "favourable"?  Doesn't that term suggest that Macdonald's detailed and favourable report was basically all about finding the terrain, for the most part, suitable?

So it seems to me.

Peter

[Mike_Cirba]

David writes:  "The Committee did not want to print it, so they gave a cursory treatment.   The Committee is generalizing not M&W." Okay, but the question is, what were M&W being specific ABOUT?  The Committee says Macdonald's report was "favorable."  Has anyone ever heard of specific routing recommendations/plans/designs that could be distilled down to "favourable"?  Doesn't that term suggest that Macdonald's detailed and favourable report was basically all about finding the terrain, for the most part, suitable?

Peter & Kirk,

Once again,  common sense and rational, organized thought is disallowed here.   

Please consider yourself unwelcome to this thread. 

I love how the Committee considered Macdonald's routing, "in general terms, favorable".   

Thank God the art of golf course criticism has evolved past those idiots. 

Heck, if their routing sucked that bad no wonder they didn't publish it.  Talk about damning with faint praise!!   


If they told us that the routing was "delicious", or "stunned", or "contrary", or "careful", or "cool", it would have been more obvious that they were describing or discussing a golf course routing than using "in general terms, favourable". 

And David and Patrick tell me that my threads are useless and indecipherable!   But, evidently, they are both channelling into the spirits of the dead Committee members and tellng us that they are hearing;

"ooo ooo oooo...we were talking about the Macdonald Whigham routing....oooo ooooo oooo" 

[Mike_Cirba]

Shivas,

No, more like damning and dismissing federally mandated travel logs for their veracity because some overworked flunkie, swamped with people boarding a huge boat, looked at a capital A and wrote R, saw a 30 year old man and marked him down as 50 years old, saw his American passport and called him an English citizen, wrote his friend Joseph's first name correctly, only to cross it out and write "George" over the top of it, and that's just the problems with that particular manifest.

More troubling were the ones where the overworked flunkie let people board with names like "H. Wilson", of no particular age, nationality, or destination disembark from the ship and enter the country. 

After reading a couple hundred or so of these things over the past few weeks, I'm about ready to vote for friggin' Pat Buchanan! 

[TEPaul]

"The ENTIRE section of land containing the 15th green and 16th tee measured about 190 yards by 130 yards, and it still does.   TEPaul just made up the 250 yard figure he used to support his premise.  He tends to do that.      

As we can see in the November 1910 Map, this corner was part of the  golf course land (and therefore part of the golf course plan)  before Nov. 15, 1910."


David:

You're absolutely right, I did just make up or estimate that distance of width of about 250 yards because I didn't interpret correctly what Richard Francis may've actually said in his story that's in the history book. For some reason I just assumed that the width at the base of the triangle about 190 yards from where the green was to be was 130 yards on that 1910 plan. Francis did not exactly say that in his story. What he said in his story was this:

"The land NOW covered by fine homes along Club House Road was exchanged for land 130 yards wide by 190 yards long..." which is just about the way it is now. He may've meant it was 130 yards wide when they got the hole in there in 1911 as we certainly don't know how wide the base of that triangle was in that 1910 proposed plan---it does look to be less than on an aerial.

Unfortunately, there is no scale on the 1910 plan but there is a way to do this by actually walking the entire width west to east of Merion below the old southern border of the Haverford College land on the 1910 plan all the way to the east border which had never changed and then just scale it against those two widths on the 1910 plan. If there's a difference significant enough to be able to get the 15th green and 16th tee in we'll have the answer. It certainly does not need to be an additional 130 yards, it only needs to be enough to get the 15th green and 16th tee up into that triangle that looks to be too narrow to do that in that 1910 plan.

But there is no question the north to south configuration of Club House Road is quite different west to east in various places than on that 1910 plan and the reason for that was to accommodate those last five holes which Francis said were difficult to get in on those 1910 dimensions reflected on that 1910 plan (actually exactly what he said was; 'the first thirteen holes were not difficult to get in but the last five were another question'). The fact is those dimensions existed until 1911 when the first 13 holes were built by the committee (or perhaps designed by the committtee ) and they had the problem with getting the last five fitted in and built!

And, of course, I hope you realize there is some irony in Francis' story EVEN IF this land-swap event took place in 1910, as you suggest which I do not now believe (I think it probably took place towards the end of the summer of 1911 when the first 13 holes were built and the last five were a problem figuring out).  And that irony is, if Macdonald did route this course and provide a hole design plan for it that Wilson and his committee merely constructed from, as you have concluded in your essay, then why didn't C.B. Macdonald figure out this problem before he left in June 1910 and not to return until the spring of 1911 for his second and final visit and probably long before the committee ran into this problem on the ground?     

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom,

I think the fact that David has proved that Macdonald/Whigham were at Merion in June 1910, and then not back again until April 1911 makes most of what we're talking about quite moot, and actually proves in and of itself that Macdonald didn't create a routing, or at least not a routing that was actually used! 

Unless he moves to tell us that Francis did his "land swap" in mid June 1910 when Macdonald was on site, then the "facts" just don't support his case whatsoever.   

It's somewhat humorous, actually, once you look at it.  Merion is already a tight property, but when he and Smithers..er...Whigham looked at the land holdings in June;

1) The Dallas property had not yet been purchased..
2) The area David believes that was mapped out by Francis had not been purchased, making the routing of the final five holes by Macdonald impossible.
3) THe area of today's 11th green and 12th tee had not been purchased.
4) The area of today's 2nd green had not yet been purchased.
5) The area of the old 12th green and 13th hole was not owned.

While Macdonald may have recommended the purchase of the Dallas property, which is very  possible, we KNOW he didn't recommend the area of the 15th/16th that Francis located, making a June 1910 routing of the final five holes impossible, and we know that he was also probably considering land that is now houses along golf course road, all of which were available for purchase by the club at that time. 

The land in question that Macdonald considered in June 1910 is approximately 75 acres of the roughly 125 that is part of today's golf course, even if you concede the purchase of the Dallas Property as something Macdonald recommended,which is at best uncertain..   According to David, it was recommended to buy 120 acres in December 1910, and it's clear that Macdonald didn't have a good deal of that land to consider back in June of that year when he supposedly did his "routing" because it simply wasn't owned by the seller at the time.

If he did magically produce a routing, which no one ever mentioned, no one ever reported, and not a single word was printed about until this post-mortem speculative effort 100 years later, it clearly was never used (perhaps because it was "mostly favourable"  ), because there simply wasn't enough land of today's present course, or even the one that was opened in 1912 for it to make any sense whatsoever..

[TEPaul]

Peter Pallotta said:

"I hope I'm not being unfair to David's hard work by bringing that basic assumption to the table. And maybe I'm seeing too much forest and missing trees, but I'd like to think that, if so, it might be a healthy corrective to people missing the forest for the trees."

Peter:

I don't see you're being unfair to David as much as you ARE being fair to the reported history of Merion and probably fair to reality!!

The fact is you sense as correct that a whole lot of people who were there at this creation back then just never said a word about Macdonald doing a course routing or hole design plan that Wilson and his committee could merely "construct" the course to.

Not a single one of them never even implied such a thing---quite the opposite, in fact. Given the fact that Merion and the people involved seemed to mention their gratitude to Macdonald/Whigam for various things he did for them to such an extent, it just doesn't make sense that suddenly everyone involved with Merion WOULD ALL get together and agree to NOT give Macdonald credit for something as architectural significant as a routing and hole design plan for Merion East that they could merely construct to. If he'd actually done something like that I have little doubt they'd have given him architectural attribution for the architecture of Merion or certain co-attribution with Wilson! After-all he was "The Great Macdonald", and they went to him---he didn't go to or solicit them! 

I think you will see if you analyze how Moriarty rationalized all this is that he constantly dismisses what various people who were there all along actually said about the creation of Merion and Wilson and committee's part in it or else he suggests that they were bending the truth as he does when he presumes that Richard Francis was engaging in "HYPERBOLE' when he told the story he did of his late night land-swap idea! Moriarty essentially has to do that with a number of people and their reports and recollections, otherwise his conclusion that Macdonald routed and designed that course just won't work. And that's why I really would like to engage him in a very specific discussion of this Francis story, and what he said about it versus what I believe to be the truth of it. I think, you, particularly, should watch carefully how he does that or more likely doesn't do that!

I think this will eventually all come down to the fact that if Moriarty has some new information he has not yet shown any of us, and none of us have seen, he may have something here with his conclusion but if this is all he has we will eventually show to all who are reading these threads that he sure doesn't have enough to get our attention or Merion GC's.

Ironically some of these people like certainly MacWood and Moriarty who sure have both said and inferred that Merion or us are being defensive (MacWood's ridiculous mention of a "Philadelpia Syndrome" which he mentioned on some of these threads and are still very much there---he can't delete them now ) and protecting legends or the status quo just isn't the case.

Wayne was over there today and talking to the historian and some others who run that club and he said if they all felt and said that if someone proves Macdonald routed and designed that course the club would be happy to embrace it, but that to the extent that they've followed these threads and Moriarty's essay, like the rest of us, they don't think he's come close.

Frankly, that's what most of MacWood's ridiculous contention is about---eg we just don't accept some of their half-cocked assumptions and conclusions and it's them who become so defensive about that. I think they try to do these things to make a name for themselves. We have no problem with somebody from outside Philly making a name for themselves with discoveries about some of our clubs and their architecture but neither of these guys have done that yet, that's for sure.

Just show us Macdonald's routing and design plan, David Moriarty or else consider letting this go!   

[TEPaul]

"2) The area David believes that was mapped out by Francis had not been purchased,"

MikeC:

You know, I never actually looked at it that way. I do have a June 24, 1909 real estate contract of all that property before MCC got interested in it and if that so-called triangle was in the metes and bounds of that contract (which I actually can read although it's handwritten and very hard to read) and I'm pretty sure Moriarty never saw before his essay, it would completely shoot down Moriarty's premise that that was the area involved in Francis' land swap (the triangle around the 15th green and 16th tee). The fact is the McFadden property and the Haverford College property to its immediate east remained unpurchased or uncontracted or untransacted throughout all this! 

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom,

That's what I've been asking David for now for days on end.

He certainly hasn't proved his case to anyone here with what he's presented to date.   Even Patrick who seems to be his biggest defender, is left to concede that it was probably designed by a "committee".

However, when I asked David to produce any additional evidence he may have in the form of a documented course routing by Macdonald, or some Merion hole drawings by Macdonald, or even a contemporaneous report by ANYONE that contends that Macdonald/Whigham had ANYTHING more to do with the Merion East golf course that what they've been credited with to date, he accuses me of insulting his character and integrity?!?!  

What the hell is that about??  

A whole bunch of fair people have already bolted from these threads and not a single one of them did so because they felt or stated that David had produced a viable, sound argument and no further discussion was needed;  in fact, exactly the opposite was/is true.

So, I'd say to David...if the verdict isn't in yet, it's definitely closing argument time, so if you've got butts, it's time to smoke 'em.

[Mike_Cirba]

"2) The area David believes that was mapped out by Francis had not been purchased,"

MikeC:

You know, I never actually looked at it that way. I do have a June 24, 1909 real estate contract of all that property before MCC got interested in it and if that so-called triangle was in the metes and bounds of that contract (which I actually can read) and I'm pretty sure Moriarty never saw before his essay, it would completey shoot down Moriarty's premise that that was the area involved in Francis' landswap (the triangle around the 15th green and 16th tee). The fact is the McFadden property and the Haverford College property to its immediate east remained unpurchased or uncontracted or untransacted throughout all this! 

Tom,

Yes, that's one way to look at it, but what I think I meant is that we know that HDC did not control the land that David mapped out for us earlier on the thread that contains the upper half of the 15th fairway/green and from the 16th tee down the fairway for the first 200 yards.

So, if that area wasn't under the control of the HDC at the time Macdonald was there, and we also know that he WASN'T the one who recommeded purchase of same (Francis did some time later), then what the hell was Macdonald looking at overall that would give him enough land to produce a routing (as David contends), especially given all the other property limitations that I outlined in my other points.

If he did a routing, it would HAVE to have included the area of homes along Golf House Road, cuz there is NO WAY to fit 18 into the rest of what he looked at, unless the course was about 5000 yards, EVEN if you give him credit for the Dallas purchase! 

[TEPaul]

One thing that David Moriarty most certainly has contributed to the history of Merion, or I should more accurately say to the history books of Merion, since some people have previously figured out some Merion history book story inconsistency, is this 1912 trip and if he could document the real estate transaction of this "Dallas Estate" I think that would be something Merion wasn't aware of. I talked to Wayne about that tonight---he said he asked Moriarty to document that but so far he hasn't responded.



"Even Patrick who seems to be his biggest defender, is left to concede that it was probably designed by a "committee"."


MikeC:

Is that what Patrick conceded? That's typical Patrick---he very often feels he's figured things out that have been known by us always and even by our grandfathers a century ago. That's Patrick for you. I'm his mentor and when I teach him something, about a week later he acts like he thought of it himself. I generally just chalk that up to being a really good teacher!

[Mike_Cirba]

Tom,

This is what Patrick wrote.   

Truth be told, I think Merion was a collaborative, not a solo effort.
One with a number of participants, including Wilson, CBM, HJH and others

I just think Patrick is siding with David here because; 1) David has no other defenders, except for Shivas who has been AWOL for a few weeks trying to quit the game , and 2) he likes to try getting under your skin. 

[Jeff_Brauer]

"For TePaul:

If in the routing phase CBM writes a letter suggesting "what could be done with the property" to what do you think he is referring?  Planting soy beans?

What do you think was in that letter if not some routing advice or suggestions?"


Jeff:

Planting soy beans??

I'm really surprised at you. First of all who said anything about routing the course? Did Macdonald's letter say that? Has David Moriarty said that because he's seen that letter? Did anyone EVER say Macdonald offered Merion a routing?? Talk about speculation. I have no idea what he said in that letter and I don't know anyone who does. For Moriarty to SPECULATE it had to be a routing is nuts? Does he even know how long Macdonald was there? Do you really think he's going to do a course design in a day or so? Maybe Macdonald said it looked like a good site to him and he felt that Merion could route, design and build a good course on it, at least that's the way every one who was there seems to report it.

Don't you think that SOMEONE might've said something about a Macdonald routing and design plan that only had to be built to? Furthermore, what was the purpose of the trip to Long Island six months later if that letter Macdonald wrote was a routing and design plan that only had to be built for God's sake? If that was the case Wilson and his committee probably could've just all gone home for good and handed the routing and design to foreman Frederick Pickering to build the course to Macdonald's routing and hole design which he'd done in a day or so!  Frederick Pickering was a very accomplished foreman but I doubt you're even aware of him at Merion.

I'm going on what the people who were around Merion all those years said about the whole thing. Moriarty has nothing to go on except some LETTER he's never even seen. This essay and campaign of his to suggest Macdonald routed and designed Merion East has gotten ridiculous, plus I believe I gave a far more plausible story of Francis' event, and one that does not require Moriarty's constant inclination to ASSUME that the person of some source material was engaging in hyperbole or lying. 

TePaul,

Yes this thread is all about speculation.  Since you base your conclusions on things the club has written (rightfully so) and they did write that their recommendations "embodied CBM's letter" I wonder what you thought was in that letter that they adopted.

It appears the club sought out CBM to consult at several major key points - at routing and land purchase, (the June 1910 visit) at design or prepping for construction (the visit to NGLA) and once during construction (Arpil 1912) so they obviously relied on his advice to some extent, presumably for land acquistion and routing.  With the property so tight, if CBM made proposals in June 1910, to acquire certain land, lengthen the course for the modern ball, etc., is it so unreasonable to speculate that he had at least some idea behind those proposals?

I don't understand the black and white nature of the argument between you and DM when I see shades of gray.  I understand that its tricky to attribute the details of the design to any particular person this late in the game but you seem hung up on the either or notion that CBM had either everything or nothing to do with the routing, while it seems reasonable to me that he made a few suggestions along the way. 

But do you really think CBM, sought out by the club for a day of advice in June 1910 really only said, "Yeah, looks good to me."  If Grissom was a friend of his and he was lending his expert advice on a limited basis, and he took the time to write back some time after the visit, and agreed to help them further in the process later, I think he would have given some thoughtful and specific proposals. 

And, could the committee have "adopted in large part the CBM letter" if it only said, "Looks good to me?"  The wording "adopted a large part" of CBMs letter suggests it was quite detailed and contained many specific ideas.

Like you, I would love to see the exact letter, and think we are still in the dark as to exactly what CBM recommended, thanks to the decorum and manners of the committee!  Damn those good manners!  The question seems to be not whether CBM assisted, but just how he assisted, and whether CBM did enough to warrant any co-design credit, or how to attribute whatever it was he did, which is a matter of opinion. 

Kirk,

I have been involved in pre-routing to determine property purchases, yes.  MCC was certainly a project where a routing would affect the land purchase.  Being so tight, if someone drew a line around a piece and said "the topo looks fine, but the land south of Ardmore Ave turned out to be only three instead of four holes wide it could be useless.  Good dimensions must follow good topos, as the Francis Land Swap story shows.  I would think it possible to likely that CBM drew a sketch not unlike the one Wayne did for discussion here for at least some parts of the property, even if not formal, to show how Barkers plan could be changed for the better. 

Maybe it was just pointing here and there, etc., and not a formal routing, but it seems as if it almost had to be routing input, given the timing.  In fact, its not impossible to believe that he critiqued the interim plans when they went to NGLA or even as they continued to refine them on site in his spring visit.

[DMoriarty]

Jeff,

The issue is not the shape of the road by the 14th tee, but rather:   When did Merion acquire the land for the 16th tee and 15th green?   Because acquiring that land allowed them to fit all the holes on the plan.  As I explain above, that corner of land was obtained in the Francis land swap, and given that that land is shown as part of the golf course on this map, this occurred before the map was created.   Before Nov. 10, 1910.   

As to your questions:

If Francis and Lloyd discussed the final land swaps sometime between 11/10 and summer 1911 when the course was under construction shouldn't the committee get some credit for the routing?

They didn't.  This was done before Nov. 1910.   But in my essay I do note that Lloyd and Francis contributed to the initial routing.  At the time Francis and Lloyd did this, there was no construction committee, only a site committee. 

Or do you think they consulted CBM before continuing?

 
I have no reason to think they consulted M&W about this.   But if you really believe TEPaul's explanation, then M&W had been back to the course before they made this change, so maybe he thinks they were consulted.

BTW, I think your posted photo proves TePaul's point more than deflects it. I don't think he said all that happened later. Just that it happened sometime post 11/15/10 and before initial course completion.

He did say it happened later.   But no matter.  It had to have happened BEFORE 11/15/10.

As you can tell from my questions, I just see the routing as an evolution of a lot of things where in reality, all the parties mentioned had some input, no matter where the final credit lies.  Is it possible that DM and TePaul are so caught up in single attribution that they are really closer in opinions than they suppose?

At least, I find myself tending to believe a timeline of events somewhere between the two camps.

I don’t care about where the final credit falls, and I am sure that Wilson deserves a lot of credit for what happened after he and his construction committee began working on the project, if this means that by your definition they should share credit, then give them all credit.  As I have said repeatedly, that is not really my concern.
___________________________________________________________

Kirk,

Thanks for coming back.  You reminded me of something critical to understanding what was going on here.  You asked:

The recommendation of the Committee was on whether or not to purchase the property, yes?

The answer is No. 

The Committee was not simply deciding whether or not to purchase a property.  Rather, the committee was choosing the particular parcels of property which best suited their needs.   And they did this based on M&W’s views as to what could be done with these parcels.

They were offered around 100 acres from HDC’s 300+ acres of land.   They didn’t say “yes” or “no.”   Rather they recommended the purchase of parcels measuring nearly 120 acres, based on M&W’s views as to what could be done with these particular parcels.  Nearly 24 acres of this “nearly 120 acres” were not even controlled by the HDC.   

So this was not a yes or no proposition.   The picked land based on what they could do with it.   Or rather, they picked the land based largely on what M&W told them they could do with it.

Now some are undoubtedly thinking that the Committee did not mention particular parcels.  But the Committee was charged with finding particular land for their golf course, so how could it have been otherwise?   It surely was not coincidence that two bordering parcels (the RR land and the Dallas Estate) just happened to bring the total up to “nearly 120 acres.”

The logical leap that I'm having trouble with is in inferring from that that there was anything amounting to a routing in that letter.

What exactly does a routing require other than the designer’s “views as to what could be done with the property?”   

Is there any chance at all that it exists?

There is always a chance.  I have not yet been able to search even some of the most obvious potential locations.

[DMoriarty]

I think the context of the Site Committee report is very important...the club and board appointed them some months earlier to find a property and they found one...CBM certainly lends credibility to the purchase and he may have done a great deal more than just say "it looks good to me", but we seem to have no evidence of anything more...surely you can agree with that David and Tom?

Hard evidence is all we're accepting at this stage of the proceedings I presume...

Hard evidence works for me.  And while we may not have the letter or know its details, we nonetheless know plenty about it, unless of course we do not believe the Committee.   For example, we know that:

 According to the Committee, they chose the land based largely on M&W’s views as to what could be done with it.

That may be hard evidence for some to swallow, but it is hard evidence nonetheless.

______________________________________________

If I've challenged David's essay, it's partly because I come to it with a basic assumption that I think is sensible or at least reasonable enough, i.e. that if Macdonald had done anything as significant as routing the course, we would've heard about it and heard about it a long time ago. Yet of all the related documents from the time not one of them credits Macdonald with something that significant; and a goodly number of them give the credit for Merion's creation to Wilson; and Macdonald moved on to Piping Rock and Yale and Lido and writing about NGLA and never mentioned Merion again. 

Peter,

This is a good question and one I have considered and will continue to consider.   One thing I disagree with is your assertion that sources of the time give Wilson credit for the routing.  I am aware of no such evidence.

I think Bob Crosby has it right when he noted that it is strange that no one really said anything about who routed Merion, and that they seemed to go to great pains to talk around the issue.   

The best explanation I have heard was from Tom MacWood, who thinks that it may have been because of Barker’s involvement.    If Macdonald was making suggestions and changes off of Barker’s routing, then Macdonald could not have rightfully claimed total credit for the routing.  Likewise, Merion could not credit Macdonald either.  And Merion could not credit Wilson because he was not even involved when the initial routing was planned.  So they talk around the issue, crediting M&W for advising, crediting Wilson and the Committee for laying the course out upon the ground, for building, seeding, finishing it, and altering it.   And Barker, who Merion did not hire, is not mentioned at all. 

Upon rereading I noticed something from Robert Lesley’s 1914 article introducing “The Merion Courses.”  The passage also speaks directly to the issue of what “laying out” a course meant, but in my rush to get it out I forgot to include it in my essay:

Lesley wrote:

”The ground was found adapted for golf and a course was laid out upon it about three years ago by the following committee: Hugh I. Wilson, chairman, R. S. Francis, H. G. Lloyd, R. E. Griscom, and Dr. Hal Toulmin, who had as advisers, Charles B.Macdonald and H. J. Whigham.”

The ground was found “adapted” for golf?    Maybe we need Rich’s old dictionary, but my understanding of word “adapt” is that it involves something changing to become better suited for a specific purpose or condition. So “ground adapted for golf” would not be raw land, but land that had been made more suited for a golf course.   Arguably, Lesley (who chaired the site committee and would become the president of MCC Golf Association) may have been vaguely and indirectly referring to the Barker routing.   If nothing else it is yet another instance where Merion seems to talk around the issue. 

Also, note how Lesley describes laying out the course.  The course was laid out upon the ground by the construction committee, who had M&W as advisors.   This is exactly how I think Wilson and others used the phrase they wrote of laying out the course.  And with this meaning, planning a lay out is not synonymous with laying the course out upon the ground.

I hope I'm not being unfair to David's hard work by bringing that basic assumption to the table. And maybe I'm seeing too much forest and missing trees, but I'd like to think that, if so, it might be a healthy corrective to people missing the forest for the trees.

It is a fair assumption but not one that I think should be dispositive.   You assume that he did not mention it because he did not design it, but there are other possible explanations that you may not have considered.  I suggest one above.   Another is simply that Macdonald may have only took credit for the courses when he or Raynor stayed involved until the course was complete.  Or may be he did not like the results.  Or maybe he liked what he contributed but not what others contributed.  I’ve little proof for any of these, but then I don’t think you have proof for your explanation either.

One thing.   Macdonald does mention Merion in his article on the Redan, using Merion’s redan as one of his examples.  While CBM doesn’t directly tout it, the other American Redans mentioned were Macdonald/Raynor holes, with the exception of a hole at Pine Valley which CBM describes something like:  a short hole with the tee high and Redan features in the green. Whigham wrote that Crump followed a few of Macdonald’s suggestions at Pine Valley, so maybe Macdonald thought of the hole at Pine Valley as his idea, too. 

David writes:  "The Committee did not want to print it, so they gave a cursory treatment.   The Committee is generalizing not M&W." Okay, but the question is, what were M&W being specific ABOUT?  The Committee says Macdonald's report was "favorable."  Has anyone ever heard of specific routing recommendations/plans/designs that could be distilled down to "favourable"? 

They were general so as to NOT convey the details, so why would you expect even distilled version of them.

Doesn't that term suggest that Macdonald's detailed and favourable report was basically all about finding the terrain, for the most part, suitable?

I don’t think so.  Providing their views on what could be done with the land cannot be boiled down to them writing “Build a golf course.”

[DMoriarty]

Tom,

I think the fact that David has proved that Macdonald/Whigham were at Merion in June 1910, and then not back again until April 1911 makes most of what we're talking about quite moot, and actually proves in and of itself that Macdonald didn't create a routing, or at least not a routing that was actually used! 

Unless he moves to tell us that Francis did his "land swap" in mid June 1910 when Macdonald was on site, then the "facts" just don't support his case whatsoever.   

It's somewhat humorous, actually, once you look at it.  Merion is already a tight property, but when he and Smithers..er...Whigham looked at the land holdings in June;

1) The Dallas property had not yet been purchased..
2) The area David believes that was mapped out by Francis had not been purchased, making the routing of the final five holes by Macdonald impossible.
3) THe area of today's 11th green and 12th tee had not been purchased.
4) The area of today's 2nd green had not yet been purchased.
5) The area of the old 12th green and 13th hole was not owned.

While Macdonald may have recommended the purchase of the Dallas property, which is very  possible, we KNOW he didn't recommend the area of the 15th/16th that Francis located, making a June 1910 routing of the final five holes impossible, and we know that he was also probably considering land that is now houses along golf course road, all of which were available for purchase by the club at that time. 

The land in question that Macdonald considered in June 1910 is approximately 75 acres of the roughly 125 that is part of today's golf course, even if you concede the purchase of the Dallas Property as something Macdonald recommended,which is at best uncertain..   According to David, it was recommended to buy 120 acres in December 1910, and it's clear that Macdonald didn't have a good deal of that land to consider back in June of that year when he supposedly did his "routing" because it simply wasn't owned by the seller at the time.

If he did magically produce a routing, which no one ever mentioned, no one ever reported, and not a single word was printed about until this post-mortem speculative effort 100 years later, it clearly was never used (perhaps because it was "mostly favourable"  ), because there simply wasn't enough land of today's present course, or even the one that was opened in 1912 for it to make any sense whatsoever..

75 acres?  With the Dallas estate? 

This entire post makes no sense.  I think you need to check your dates, math, and logic.   

H.J. Whigam wrote that Macdonald Designed Merion.   He was there.  Were you? 

[Phil_the_Author]

David,

You opined that "Also, note how Lesley describes laying out the course.  The course was laid out upon the ground by the construction committee, who had M&W as advisors.   This is exactly how I think Wilson and others used the phrase they wrote of laying out the course.  And with this meaning, planning a lay out is not synonymous with laying the course out upon the ground..."

I disagree with this conclusion.

There are numerous examples of architects "laying out a course" on the ground and THEN "designing it on paper." Let me explain.

Quite often archietects at this time would walk a property and stake out the routing locating tee and green sites and basic fairway shapes. Tilly did this often and then put the design on paper.

Let me give you a prime example of this. Please take careful attention as to how Tilly used the phrase "lay out." The meaning is quite evident and, as he was a contemporaneous designer of courses at the time Merion was being created, I think his definition of the phrase should be given great weight in this discussion:

“After a careful examination and analysis of the new property, I agree to lay out two (2) courses, each of eighteen (18) holes. These are to be staked on the ground and after the various points had been located by your surveyor, I am to prepare a completely detailed working plan of the thirty-six (36) holes, showing other vital features, such as Driveways, Parking places for motor cars, Tennis Courts and Practice Grounds for Driving and Putting. 

Tilly would "lay out" the two courses on the ground FIRST. This included tees & greens and fairway shapes. It would THEN be surveyed and ONLY FOLLOWING THIS would he put the course design on paper.

It is quite evident that the laying out of the course was the actual design of it. INDIVIDUAL FEATURES such as bunker locations green shapes were added later AFTER it was put on paper.

Isn't this EXACTLY what was done at Merion? It seems everyone agrees that Wilson and his committee "laid out" the course on the ground and LATER ON figured where to place bunkers, etc...

Tilly would and did understand the phrase "lay out a golf course" to be synonomous to "designing it" and that this was also synonomous with the use of the terms "planning" and developing."

He certainly seems to make this connection in his 1934 article titled "Merion and the Open" which has been quoted from in these Merion threads. Consider carefully how Tilly defined "lay out" and "design" in 1924 in the case of 5 Farms and what he wrote 10 years later:

"So few seemed to know that the Merion course was planned and developed by Hugh Wilson, a member of the club who showed a decided flair for golf course architecture..."

Note how "planned and developed" is equated to golf course architecture. Tilly certainly knew the difference between a construction overseer and and architect and he was clearly calling Wilson an architect rather than a constructor.

[Mike_Cirba]

Phil,

Shhhhhhhhhhhh....

Remember that according to David, nobody ever said that Wilson "routed" the course.

How often did you hear that term in 1910??

Of course, the fact that we've provided David with mucho evidence that Wilson "laid out" and "conceived" and "planned" the course from many sources should be discarded, because those early writers didn't use the magic word that David suddenly wants to hear which is "created the routing". 

We're evidently supposed to willfully suspend disbelief to accept that when M&W "advised as to what could be done to the property" obviously meant a routing plan and hole designs, yet when Wilson "laid out", "Planned", "Conceived" of the holes he was a glorified construction foreman. 

It's a shell game.

[TEPaul]

As to what was generally meant by the term "lay out" or "laying out" a course back in those early days I don't think it's worthwhile to consult a dictionary, I think it is far more worthwhile to simply supply a few examples from people involved with golf course architecture back in the early days which Merion was and just look at what specifically they mean and what exactly they’re talking about when they used that term:

This is from Tom MacWood’s “In My Opinion” piece on this website entitled “Arts and Crafts Golf” in which he uses the term and quotes how Bernard Darwin used the term:

"One of the reasons these men failed was due to the methods they utilized in laying out these golf courses, or the lack there of. The ancient links may have taken centuries to be formed, these men preferred a much shorter duration. There was very little time and even less forethought put into the design of a golf course. As Bernard Darwin’s described, 'The laying out of courses used once to be a rather a rule-of-thumb business done by rather simple-minded and unimaginative people who did not go far beyond hills to drive over, hollows for putting greens and, generally speaking, holes formed on the model of a steeplechase course.'"

Here is the way Hugh Wilson described what his committee was charged with doing at Merion;

“Our problem was to lay out the course, build and seed eighteen greens and fifteen fairway…...

And here may be the most appropriate of all to what was meant by “lay out” to our discussion of Merion:

This is from H.H. Barker’s letter to Connell which included his rough pencil “lay out” drawing. Logically, Connell must have given it to Merion’s site committee who showed it to MCC’s board, otherwise one wonders why Connell bothered to pay Barker to do it at all.

In his letter to Connell that would go to the MCC site committee and the MCC board H.H. Barker said:

“I am enclosing a sketch of the property in question on which I have roughly shown in pencil a proposed LAY OUT of the course.”

So we should be able to see that in none of those examples with the use of the term “lay out” does it seem to conform to David Moriarty’s assumption of what it means which in his essay is basically Wilson and his committee taking a developed routing and hole design plan and simply BUILDING it on the ground. I mean Hugh Wilson probably never would’ve won a Pulitzer Prize for his writing but he did say: “Our problem was to lay out AND build….”. If he just meant to say that he and the committee’s only problem was to build a course off a lay out (as Darwin and Barker used the term) or routing or developed hole by hole plan given to them by someone else, I doubt he even would have been quite so redundant as to have used both “Lay out” and then “build” as the next word, and refer to both as "OUR PROBLEM". Logically, he would’ve just said our problem was to BUILD eighteen greens and fifteen fairways, if he and his committee was actually doing what Moriarty’s essay suggested he was doing with a developed Macdonald routing and hole by hole plan. and finally, H.H. Barker used the term at Merion in June 1910 and no one has said he was about to BUILD a golf course at Merion Ardmore! 

[TEPaul]

This is from post #449 on the "essay" thread. I think I'll just keep posting it to see if I can get David Moriarty to really engage in a discussion of ALL THE DETAILS of this Francis land swap idea Francis  got in the middle of the night and went to Lloyd with. I believe it has maximum importance in determining what probably is an accurate and factual timeline on who did what and when on Merion East. This story has been part of Merion's recorded history for a long time (Francis wrote about the story in 1950). Moriarty included this Francis story in his essay but altered and qualified the apparent time events in the story took place and some of the details of it with his assumption that Francis was somehow engaging in 'hyperbole'.

If during that discussion on the Francis event, David Moriarty just begins to dismiss this Francis story or report as he has with other Merion source material that has made up the Merion history, then I doubt I'm willing to continue on with this subject and what happened.

I just don't think it's a realistic thing to do with the history of a course to start an analysis by simply dismissing as somehow untrue all that made up a history so that one can just reinsert an entirely different interpretation of a subject of real importance---eg who routed, designed and built a golf course.

The following post is from the other thread that I'm going to keep posting to try to get Moriarty to engage in ALL the details and words and descriptions in that Francis late night land swap idea that was accepted;

 

[TEPaul]

David Moriarty:

If I can somehow engage you in a really intelligent (read not dismissive or constant denials on your part) of all the ramifications and the significance of this Francis land-swap story and WHEN you speculate it took place I think we will find your entire essay may not be very supportable and is definitely not based on what you keep claiming is fact, UNLESS you really can produce some specfic land transfer transactions that support your assumption of that Francis land swap event, and particularly WHEN you say it took place. All of that is something I've definitely never been aware of.

If you can do that I very well may buy into your conclusion or get a whole lot more interested in it because I am not aware of those specific transactions at a date or even the year that would remotely support your premise about what you said about Francis and that particular event. I guarantee you I will keep at your interpretation of that entire Francis story so everyone who reads these threads is aware of it.

I'm not even sure, at this point, if you're aware of all the significance in that entire story to your essay. We should get into that because if you have something I've never been aware of, again, you may end up going a long way to convincing me that your conclusion in your essay should be seriously looked into. But if you have none of the specifics you seem to base your Francis premise on I can't see that your essay will hang together.

Are you ready to really go over that entire Francis story now?   

[Mike_Cirba]

Shivas,

You've missed a lot.   You should thank God for that! 

For instance, we know that the Barker routing couldn't have been used because most of the parcels in his 100 acre "lay out" weren't part of the existing property, and he would have been considering all of the holdings of the HDC, not just those we know were purchased.   That would have included the real estate areas.

[TEPaul]

Shivas:

Your constant parsing of words to torture logic really is getting funny. In no way was Barker talking about the act of actually BUILDING a golf course from a plan in his letter to Connell. He's only referring to a piece of paper on which he drew a rough sketch of A golf course "lay out" for some land at an over 300 acre potential real estate development. We don't even know if it was on all the same land as the course was eventually BUILT. Connell had no involvement in MCC and who really knows where on over those 300 acres he wanted it to be?

On the other hand, if Moriarty or anyone else could ever PRODUCE what Barker drew we may some day find out if it's on the same land. Frankly, the very same thing goes for this phantom routing and hole design plan that Moriarty is basing his entire conclusion on. As far as I can tell NO ONE has ever seen such a thing around MCC or Merion G.C. in nearly a century. Why do you suppose that is? Are you also buying into this preposterous notion of Tom MacWood's of what he has referred to on this site as the "Philadelphia Syndrome" were anyone and everyone involved in these courses from there beginnings until today is engaged in a conspiracty not to tell the truth?   

[Mike_Cirba]

I'm curious which specific 120 acres Macdonald/Whigham purportedly recommended for purchase.   Or, whether they just told the committee that for a championship golf course of about 6200 yards they would need at least 20% more than the 100 acres Barker recommended, for a nice, neat 120 acres.   They may even have looked over from today's 3rd tee and recommended the Dallas Estate as something the group should consider purchasing.

But, using the Google Planimeter, this is what I come up with for the property;

The land (not including the Francis "swap" land, or the railroad owned land) on the north side of Ardmore Avenue, but including homes that jut in from the left in a semi-circle on Golf House Road (for rectangular measurement purposes) - 52.3 acres

The land of the "Dallas Estate" - 21 acres

The land on the south side of Ardmore avenue, not including what was purchased for today's 11th and 12 holes in 1924, and also not including the land that was purchased to extend the 2nd hole years later - 38.83 acres.

That adds up to 112.13 acres

Then, we subtract 11 acres that intercede in a semi-circle from the left of Golf House Road where homes were built, leaving 101.13 acres.

We consider the 3 acres that the Railroad owned as possibly being part of what Macdonald/Whigham considered for 104.13 acres

That leaves the 4.8 acres of the Francis land swap that we KNOW M&W didn't route up by 15 and 16.

I'm still about 11 acres short of the course that opened in 1912.  

In actuality, of the course that opened in 1912, considering what we know that M&W theoreticallydesigned, we're actually about 16 acres short.

What am I missing?